




lj 

M r <\ j^f'— . f 

»& W i 



&• 

wkh[ BB& 1 

Hw ft ?A I 

V 

™ jbBf ^11 fl 

I 

Jpg’ g.£$fe ' 

£:? ;> 1 flj| | ■ J 

B®/ mi 


i| 

? ■ ■ - -m <Mb&&Sff M 

.j£F : «H HV 




?( is 




/ N«s«agR 










■ 


'IP , 


LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, 


Shelf ..I, 




UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 


■ 


r* tt* 



















===== 









— 


_ — 


- 






S»*J*V- -wf^TO^ Vu^ 1 • 


THE 


TWO PATHS 




* LOUISA DALTON 


AND OTHER 


STORIES AND SKETCHES 


REPRINTED FROM THE 
“AVE MARIA” 



H. L. Kilner & Co. 

PUBLISHERS 




Copyright, 1892 

BY 

H. L. KILNER & CO. 


CONTENTS. 


Two Paths, - 
A Tale the Bretons Tell, 

The Madonna of the Emerald, 

A Midnight Penitent, - 
The Miracle of Metz, 

An Extraordinary Answer to Prayer, 
The Legend of the Ghostly Mass, 
Barry’s Christmas Gift, - 



TWO PATHS. 


i. 

The noise of a cannon was heard 
through the fog. The iron throats of 
the old battery in front of the summer 
hotel were saluting the passenger steamer, 
whose answering whistle was hoarse, 
like the voice of some great animal in 
pain. — “ Boom ! ” 

Pierre Lachange strode forward through 
the high grass, remarking to himself, in 
rather bad French, that the boat was un- 
commonly late. He gave it no other 
thought ; the movements of the steamers 
mattered little to him, unless when he 
went to sell his fish. The new hotel on 
the hillside stretched its arms out amone 
the birch-trees. The light from the win- 
dows illuminated the lawn, making it pos- 


8 


Two Paths. 


sible, by the aid of the long northern 
twilight, for a few of the guests to finish an 
interesting, though not very level, game 
of lacrosse. Within the building, servants 
were flitting to and fro ; and in the din- 
ing-room, the great event of the day was 
in progress. 

Pierre gave a glance at these sights, 
realizing for the hundredth time that he 
lived a life apart from them ; but finding, 
as usual, a charm in their very strange- 
ness ; and stopped in the shadow of a ga- 
ble to chat with another habitant about 
the price of blueberries. That subject 
exhausted, there remained still the lum- 
ber rafts and the salmon and the new 
curd; and at the end of half an hour the 
chatter had not ceased. 

“ And they said,” Pierre was murmur- 
ing — “ what is that ?” 

A procession was solemnly winding 
up the hillside. A woman lay upon a rude 
stretcher; a white-capped nurse carried a 
little child, and various friendly people 
followed, wondering and sympathetic. 
The sick lady would die, they said. No 
one knew what the illness was. “Some- 
thing contagious, perhaps,” suggested one, 


Two Paths. 


9 


at which the timid among them shrank 
away. Pierre hurried to meet them, 
gently pushed one of the feebler bearers 
to one side and took his place. 

The plump landlord came to the door 
of the hotel, alarm written upon every 
feature. “ Go away ! ” he screamed, wav- 
ing his hands. “ Go away !” 

“ But the sick lady must find shelter 
somewhere.” 

“ She can not come here. There is no 
knowing what the disease is.” 

“But,” said one, “she can not be com- 
fortable in our small houses, already so 
full and noisy.” 

“I tell you to go away!” roared the 
landlord. “ My guests will not have it. 
There is cholera in the States. There 
will be a panic.” 

The nurse began to weep afresh, and 
the sick woman moaned. 

“Take her to my mother’s,” said 
Pierre, with decision. “We have few 
comforts, but we have hearts softer than 
stone.” 

The landlord did not hear this remark, 
having already slammed the door. 

Mother Lachange, a dumpy woman, in 


IO 


Two Paths. 


a blue homespun gown, stood on her 
threshold looking for her son. A loaf of 
bread, dark and moist, was upon the table, 
and the floor had been scrubbed until it 
shone like her own white hair. The spin- 
ning-wheel was pushed into a corner, and 
the good woman’s thoughts were busy 
with her many blessings, her fingers mean- 
while guiding the dancing needles with- 
out which Pierre’s winter stockings would 
never be fashioned. 

“ Dear Pierre !” she thought. “ Where 
in all the province is there another like 
him ? Who can trap a bear or catch a 
salmon as he can ? Who can sing at the 
fetes with a voice to match his ? ” 

She heard his voice now, hearty and 
strong; but he was not singing. And 
what were all those men bringing, tramp- 
ing slowly over the daisies and the 
golden-rod ? 

“A sick woman from the boat, moth- 
er,” explained Pierre quickly, in his chop- 
ped-off French. “They would not take 
her at the hotel, and I brought her to 
you.” 

Mother Lachange asked no questions. 
“ Put her on my bed,” she said. She had 


Two Paths . 


1 1 

the curiosity of her race, but there would 
be time for questioning afterward. The 
men who had borne the burden in, went 
outside and whispered softly among them- 
selves ; but within the little house there 
were quick commands, and the noiseless 
bustle which abounds when there is life 
at stake. 

The nurse redoubled her lamentations. 
“Be quiet ! ” said Mother Lachange ; “and 
hush the little one.” The girl replied 
with a torrent of words, which no one 
could understand ; but her weeping was 
subdued, as Pierre’s mother brewed odor- 
ous herbs, and he hurried away for the 
cure. Not for the doctor — oh, no ! There 
was no doctor in St. Genevieve with half 
the skill of the woman with the calm eyes 
and shining hair, who was moving swiftly 
about the low-raftered room. But no skill 
availed with the stranger, and when 
Pierre, breathless almost, came back, 
bringing help for the soul so soon to try 
the mysteries of the unknown land, death 
was very near. She stretched out her 
arms in a feeble way, and they laid the 
child within them. Then a sweet calm 
settled upon her face. 


12 


Two Paths. 


"Mary!” she said; smiled, and died 
before the smile faded. Whether she 
with her last word gave her infant a name, 
or whether she called upon the Mother of 
her Lord, no one knew. The voice of 
the priest was heard uttering the petitions 
for the death of the faithful, the woman 
being unmistakably a Catholic ; but there 
was no other sound. When the rites 
were over, he turned, thinking to make 
one more endeavor to understand the ser- 
vant, but her seat was empty. She had 
watched her chance to leave the room 
unobserved, had run to the departing 
steamer, guided by its lights, and no one 
in St. Genevieve ever saw the sturdy Scan- 
dinavian again. 

They buried the stranger in the church- 
yard upon the hill ; and the tears of 
Mother Lachange flowed fast as she stood 
beside the open grave, with little Marie 
laughing and crowing in her arms. Of 
course, the good friends among whom the 
baby had been thrown, as a bit of sea- 
weed is washed upon the shore, set to 
work at once to find traces of her people. 
With the help of the curd they advertised 
far and wide ; they questioned the passen- 


Two Paths. 


13 


gers of each incoming boat ; the ctcrd him- 
self wrote innumerable letters to distant 
friends, and followed every clue, however 
slight, to the end. But nothing availed. 
Weeks fled, and autumn came, bringing 
cold blasts from the north, scattering the 
summer visitors, and stripping the ver- 
dure from the earth, and the vines from 
the cottages ; but no one sent for little 
Marie. Autumn gave way to winter ; the 
snow was piled as high as the houses, and 
covered the hills like a garment ; but little 
Marie seemed to be forgotten by the 
world. And never did storm-tossed bird 
fold its tired wings in a sweeter place of 
rest. 

“ I hope her people will come soon or 
not at all,” said Mother Lachange, as the 
spring came around again. “ If she stays 
with us a little longer, it will break my 
heart to give her up.” 

The stolid Breton peasant woman was 
not often sentimental like this. It seemed 
as if the coming of the child had unlocked 
fresh reservoirs of love and poetry within 
her breast. 

“It’s my opinion,” answered Pierre, 
“that they will never come for her. It 


i4 


Two Paths. 


is all strange. It would have been easy 
to trace them here. I think the good 
God means that you are to keep the 
child.” 

The mother’s eyes, long unused to 
weeping, filled with happy tears. A blos- 
som had fallen, apparently from heaven, 
into the Indian Summer of her somewhat 
dreary life ; and she accepted it with sim- 
ple gratitude, never counting the cost or 
care. God and His saints had sent little 
Marie ; that was enough. The trunk of 
clothing left on shore with the sick wo- 
man that eventful night was stored away in 
the attic, with the snow-shoes, the odor- 
ous herbs and simple belongings, for 
which there was no room below. It con- 
tained nothing from which the parentage 
of the child could be discovered. If doc- 
uments or letters existed which would 
have given any clue, they were probably 
in the hand-bag which the nurse carried 
off in her mad flight. The letters M. F. 
A. were upon the trunk, and the same in- 
itials wrought into the linen within it ; but 
that was all. Upon the child’s tiny gar- 
ments there was no mark whatever. 

So the trunk and its contents were 


Two Paths . 


15 


shouldered by Pierre and carried aloft ; 
and Mother Lachange in some way found 
time to fashion clothing better suited to 
the daughter of a fisherman than that 
brave with lace and embroidery, which 
lay. with scented leaves between its folds, 
in the little attic room. 

The child was adopted through due 
compliance with the law, and became, as 
fast as it could make her, Marie La- 
change. As one year after another passed 
and nothing happened, Mother La- 
change gradually lost her fear lest this 
little storm-tossed bird which had been 
driven into her nest should be torn from 
its safe shelter. 

Meanwhile the tiny maid roamed about 
the hills at will ; gathering a knowledge 
of their dora and fauna, learning the laws 
which governed the tides, how to snare 
the salmon and manage a canoe. In the 
summer season she sold wild flowers to 
the tourists, who flocked on shore for a 
few minutes or an hour, as the tide per- 
mitted, and who bought the worthless 
blossoms of the child just because of her 
sweet, shy ways. And within the dormer- 
windowed house Mother Lachange taught 


i6 


Two Paths. 


her how to spin, and how to fashion 
Pierre’s big stockings from the yarn, and 
guided the tiny fingers through all the 
mysteries of baking and brewing. Then 
when night fell, and the cow was milked 
and fed, and the bread set to rise for the 
morrow, Marie would fly across the field 
to the old stone house where Father Pi- 
card, the young curt, dwelt with his 
mother. Ah ! there was another world. 
The cow was forgotten, and the wild 
northern landscape changed to the 
Champs-Elysdes, as the child listened to 
the words of the French lady ; her eyes 
shining, and her little heart throbbing 
fast. 

Madame Picard was homesick in the 
wilderness, Marie was the best of listen- 
ers. What wonder that the gentle lady 
loved to prattle by the hour of another 
land, where the sun always shone ; where 
acres of roses sent their perfume abroad 
upon the happy wind ; where the air was 
soft, and the grapes swelled and ripened 
on the vines ; and where the gay people 
were light of heart as butterflies poised on 
a rose ? She had in her veins the blood 
of the old noblesse , always brave and long- 


Two Paths. 


l 7 


suffering ; but this life in the New World, 
so novel at first, in time grew dull and 
painful. Her son, for whose sake she had 
crossed the ocean and lighted her house- 
hold fires in the land its founders called 
New France, was busy with the cares of 
his large parish ; and she found no other 
adult companion among all the inhab- 
itants of St. Genevieve. 

Marie, though, was unlike the rest : 
catching the lights and shades of the 
stories of past ages as they were clothed in 
the French woman’s winning speech; and 
learning the ways of the outside world, 
which was to her, except for Madame Pi- 
card’s glowing descriptions, an unknown 
land, as far away as the stars. She learned 
much of real use as well from her kind 
friend, whom it made happier to guide 
that fresh young mind. She learned to 
speak pure French, to embroider with 
fairy stitches, to sing with taste and pre= 
cision ; and gained more than a smatter* 
ing of the solid learning which Madame 
Picard had brought from her convent; 
school. 

And so the years rolled by, and Marie 
was seventeen— a shy, slim girl, with 


Two Paths . 


1 8 

olive skin, dark, wistful eyes, and a mass 
of waving hair the color of gold. There 
was no one at home to tell her she was 
beautiful, but the eyes of the summer 
visitors (St. Genevieve had become a 
thronged resort) were fixed upon her, to 
the evident chagrin and alarm of Pierre 
and his mother. Pierre was married now, 
and little children made the old house 
: bright. 


II. 

It was early in August, and the day’s 
work was done. Marie strolled rather 
listlessly over toward the parsonage, 
knitting as she walked. She knew her 
own history now, or what little there was 
to learn ; and the feeling that she must 
go out into the world to see its wonders, 
and find her own people, had strength- 
ened with her strength. She felt, or 
rather thought she felt, that the wave of 
destiny which had tossed her upon this 
■-shore ' had thrown her among • aliens. 
She had long ago found by listening to 


1 


Tzvo Paths . 19 

Madame Picard’s pure speech, that the 
patois of the peasants was unpleasant. 
Pierre’s children were disagreeable, and 
the house always smelled of fish ; some- 
times even of garlic. She had looked 
over the contents of the trunk, which was 
her only heritage, and knew that the gar- 
ments were those of gentle people ; and 
she wove romances without stint, of 
which she was the central figure : in fancy 
meeting her relatives, who would make 
her the idol of their hearts, and give her 
the luxuries her station demanded. Be 
patient with her. She was young, imag- 
inative, with other blood than that 
which coursed so slowly through the 
veins of Breton peasants ; and the grand 
air and wide culture of the dear old 
French lady had unwittingly tended to 
confirm her in her discontent. 

Throngs of people from the hotel were 
trooping over the fields in search of cer- 
tain scarlet berries, with which to deco- 
rate the parlors for some sort of a fete 
they had in view. One lady caught sight 
of Marie. 

“ Ah, you dear little thing !” she cried. 
“ I was looking for you. I have a very 


20 


Tzvo Paths. 


special errand this time, and I did not 
dare venture into the jaws of your mother 
— grandmother — what do you call her?” 

“ She does not bite,” said Marie, ignor- 
ing the question. “And she would be 
polite to anybody.” 

“ But then, you must know, my dear 
child, that she does look upon us as very 
frivolous people, and thinks we may 
make a worldling of you, if you see too 
much of us.” 

Marie was silent. “ Worldling” was a 
new word, and she did not fancy the 
sound of it. 

“ And indeed this time she would have 
cause,” went on the vivacious woman ; 
“for I have the most charming plan for 
you, and I am sure she would never 
approve of anything so agreeable. In 
two weeks I leave St. Genevieve ; the 
nights are getting so cold, they give me 
the neuralgia; and I mean to take you 
with me.” 

Marie knitted very fast, and a little 
frown settled between her eyes. “ But if 
I do not choose to be taken?” 

“ Oh, I can’t entertain such a thought 
for a moment !” Mrs. Thompson replied, 


Two Paths . 


21 


following up her advantage. "You sim- 
ply must go, and they owe it to you to 
let you.” 

"In what — ” began Marie, haughtily, 
hesitating for a word. 

" Capacity ? ” suggested Mrs. Thomp- 
son. 

"Yes. In what capacity would you 
take me with you, as you say it ? ” 

" Why, in no capacity at all. That is 
the best of it. lust come and talk 
French with the children. I will give 
you a good salary — you needn’t look so 
surprised at the word : salaries are very 
convenient things; — and at the end of a 
year, if you don’t wish to stay longer, 
you can come back with money enough to 
make you an aristocrat forever in this 
wretched place.” 

Marie meditated. The aristocrats of 
whom Madame Picard had spoken had 
little to do with money; indeed, she re- 
membered one duchess who sold her hair 
to the jailer when she went to the guillo- 
tine, that her child might not starve. 
There was a strange confusion of terms, 
but doubtless all would be made clear in 
time. 


22 


Two Paths . 


“You need not hurry about deciding,” 
said Mrs. Thompson. "And you will 
have to talk the grandmother over, for 
she can’t understand me. I do hope you 
will go. You would not be a servant, 
you see; only my little friend. Even 
the money shall be a secret between us. 
Come out to-morrow, after you have 
slept over the matter. Good-night ! ” 
And she gathered up her voluminous 
skirts and went to rejoin her companions, 
feeling that the leaven had been left to 
work — that she stood a good chance of 
securing a French nursery governess for 
her children at a very reasonable price. 

And Marie? All at once the scene 
grew dearer : the familiar landscape illu- 
mined ; each tree was a beloved friend ; 
the faces of Pierre and his mother beau- 
tiful and tender. No, she would never 
leave them ; and she counted the stitches 
in the heel of the stocking, and resolved 
to forget the odious stranger’s enticing 
words. 

She said nothing of the matter to the 
curd's mother who that evening told her 
for the hundredth time of the dreadful 
days when the guillotine was king, and 


Two Paths . 


23 


of the pious lords and ladies who shed 
the best blood of France at its horrible 
behest. Marie tried to be as attentive as 
usual, but the poison of the world’s praise 
was working in her mind. Why would 
Pierre eat garlic, and- his mother wear 
such big shoes ? And she could earn 
money just by talking to those children ; 
and her hands would grow white in time, 
like Mrs. Thompson’s. 

A change in the voice of Madame 
Picard awoke her from her dream. 

"You are so silent to-niodit, dear one! 
Is everything quite well with you ?” asked 
the lady, in tender tones. 

"Oh, yes;” — then, contradicting her- 
self, — "but I have things to trouble me 
like other people.” 

" Are they not all very kind to you at 
the good Pierre’s?” 

“ Oh, most kind, Madame ! It is not 
that. But have you never thought what 
it was to hear of the wonderful, great 
world, and to know you should never see 
it — never see anything but this- black 
river and the birch-trees? I hate them 
sometimes ! I want to see cities, and the 
people who live in them ; I want to see 


24 


Two Paths. 


everything beautiful and great. I was 
not born here, you know. I have not 
the content of these people. Oh, I am 
so wicked, and so unhappy ! ” 

“ May the good God forgive me if I 
have helped to make you so ! ” said the 
lady, reverently. I have thought only 
to please you, dear, and divert myself as 
well. I have only told you the pleasant 
side of what you call the wonderful great 
world. It is full of dreadful sin that you 
can not imagine. There is no happiness 
but peace ; and that is here, where peo- 
ple are not so filled with the wisdom of 
the world that they are ashamed to serve 
God.” 

“You are right, — I am sure you are 
right. I will not think the wrong thoughts 
again.” 

And so they talked of other things ; 
of the Lachange baby’s teething and the 
curd's new soutane ; and Marie, before 
going home, stole into the church, and 
found comfort and strength before the 
altar of the Blessed Virgin. 


Two Paths . 


25 


III. 

There was a shadow over the old stone 
house. Pierre was silent, and his wife 
glanced at him furtively as she hushed 
her children. 

“ It is about money/’ whispered Moth- 
er Lachange. “ A bank in Quebec has 
closed, and his savings were in it.” 

Marie thought of Mrs. Thompson’s 
words. 

“ And you know what the fishing has 
been this year,” Pierre’s mother went on. 
“ I am sure we shall get through the 
winter in some way, just as we have 
other winters ; but it is no wonder that he 
forgets to sing to-night.” 

The leaven of unrest had a new im- 
petus, and Marie’s late and well-meant 
resolution vanished from her memory. 
When the last black-eyed baby was still, 
and the mother asleep from very wear- 
iness, the girl told, simply and unre- 
servedly, of Mrs. Thompson’s offer. 
Before she had finished the stout arms of 
Mother Lachange were about her. 

“ Oh, my child, you shall never leave us! 


2 6 


Two Paths . 


We do not care for the golden dollars 
you would gather. Pierre, tell her that 
she must not o*o.” 

But Pierre had nothing to say. 

“ Speak, my son ; you are her father in 
the law.” 

Then Pierre spoke. “ I do not see how 
we are to get through the winter, and 
perhaps it is best for her to go,” he said, 
slowly. 

A nervous torrent of words from his 
mother interrupted him; but Marie raised 
her little hand, dark and rough from 
berry-picking. “ He is right,” she said. 
“ I will go, and I will come back again.” 

“ They all say they will come back, and 
they never do ! ” cried Mother Lachange. 

“ Have I ever told you a lie?” 

- “ Never, dear one.” 

“ Well, listen now. If the good God 
keeps me alive I will come back.” And 
so wisely did she plead, and so deftly lead 
the talk to other things, that before bed- 
time came, the smiles were in their accus- 
tomed places upon the face of the elder 
woman, and the trunk in the garret had 
been tenderly ransacked to see if it con- 
tained such clothes as befitted a young 


Two Paths , 27 

woman about to try her fortune in the 
world. 

A slim little figure was standing in the 
pale sunshine when Mrs. Thompson left 
the hotel the next morning. 

“ I will go,” announced Marie, coming 
to the point at once, as was her wont. 
“ I can talk the French of Madame 
Picard, and I will teach your children. 
But I do not wish to be your friend, as 
you said: I wish to earn money. You 
can arrange that with Pierre.” 

“Why, my dear,” protested Mrs. 
Thompson — mentally ejaculating, “Mer- 
cenary creature ! ” — “ do not be so unkind. 
If you do not wish to feel friendly, I am 
sure you will not suit me at all.” 

“That is not what I meant. I mean 
that I do not wish you to think what is 
not so. It is not that I care for you or 
the children that I will go : it is for the 
money, and I will do what is right.” 

“ Cool ! ” was Mrs. Thompson’s inward 
comment; but this lofty candor only 
added to the value of her treasure. She 
knew that she could trust the child. 

Marie, the matter settled, rushed to 
Madame Picard. There was no defensive 


28 


Two Paths. 


armor now, — no stiff, dignified little ways. 
The gentle woman put her arms around 
the girl and blessed her. 

“You do right to go, my child; and you 
will let me give you some good counsel 
about the great world. It is, perhaps, 
best that you see it with your own young 
eyes.” Then she poured forth instruc- 
tions which she thought fitted the case. 
Slightly prim and austere they were, those 
social rules of another country and period; 
but they suited well one reared in the 
Province, which is, says one, not the 
France of to-day, but the France of Louis 
Quatorze. The kind warnings of her 
friend sank into Marie’s heart like a strong 
foot into the mellow soil of spring. 
“You have the proper manner, dear,” 
added the curd' 's mother, “ except that you 
are somewhat — what shall I call it ? — too 
plain of speech often. It would be better 
if you could learn to coat a bitter pill with 
sugar. But then,” with a sigh, “it is the 
blood of the Puritan, I suppose ; and it 
will always be easiest for you to go about 
saying what you think, and nothing else.” 

“And what should I say, Madame? 
The truth, surely?” 


Two Paths . 


29 


“ There are two ways of speaking the 
truth, and one should learn what not to 
say. That is tact — the very finest. I 
have a plain friend. I tell her she is ugly; 
that is truth, and it pains her heart. But I 
say only that when she speaks the soul 
shines in her face, like a lamp behind a 
window ; that is truth, too, and she is 
happy. It has cost me little, and is it 
not the kinder ! ” 

So the lady went on with her Old 
World wisdom; and Marie listened, and 
tried to heed, and remember, as the time 
of her going away drew near. She would 
have no modern clothes, — no cheap imi- 
tation of the gowns of the summer board- 
ers. 

“ I have no wish to look like a lady,” 
she told Pierre’s mother. “ People do 
not hire ladies to look after their children. 
I will dress just as I do here when I go 
after the cow.” 

So one more gown was made, of the 
dark blue stuff which their own hands had 
spun and woven ; and plenty of trim 
aprons were fashioned, each with its own 
white Normandy cap. All her hair, the 
color of burnished gold, was drawn to the 


30 


Two Paths. 


top of her head as she tried on those 
pretty caps ; but little tendrils would 
escape, as if protesting against the garb 
of servitude. 

Mother Lachange did not fully approve 
of this freak of Marie’s. She would have 
had the child equip herself with the stock 
of fine garments lying among the lavender 
in the garret. 

“ If you should meet your own people,” 
she remonstrated, ''you will shame them 
by looking like a servant.” 

“You are my own people!” cried 
Marie, her long, dark lashes wet. “ And 
I am to be a servant, whatever Mrs. 
Thompson may pretend ; and if I am not, 
it is no thanks to them. I no longer 
wish to meet them ; that is all over. I 
will wear the dark blue gowns that you 
have made. Then I will never forget 

o 

that I have promised to come back. And 
I surely will come back ! ” she ended, fling- 
ing her arms about her adopted mother. 

Mrs. Thompson secretly rejoiced in 
the curious pride which made Marie’s 
fine taste prevail. She had worried lest 
the girl should try to copy the clothes 
that. she would see, and had thought how 


Two Paths . 


quickly the picturesque would vanish be- 
fore fashionable headgear. 

Finally, all was ready. The cure had 
written to a friend in New York to keep 
an eye on Marie ; his mother had hung a 
blessed medal about her neck, as she 
kissed each cheek in her French fashion ; 
Pierre had turned away with an unmanly 
lump in his throat, and all the babies had 
been embraced over and over. Mother 
Lachange was not to be found, but Marie 
knew where she was. Prostrate before 
the altar of the Blessed Virgin the elder 
woman lay. And the fog lifted, and the 
steamer screeched, and some one drew 
the gangplank away. The journey to 
the world was begun. 

It is hard for us to fancy what that 
journey was to the young Marie — the lit- 
tle bit of flotsam tossed by a wave upon 
that Northern shore so long before. 
Nothing that could be dignified as a 
memory had kept a place in her mind ; 
but so strong is heredity, so wonderful 
the ties which link us with our own flesh 
and blood, that once in a while, as she 
had been driving home the cow, or stroll- 
ing across the hills to the place where 


Two Paths. 


'y ? 

O 1 

the blueberries hid, or watching the great 
constellations burning in the heavens, like 
a strain of forgotten music, the ghost of 
what seemed a remembrance would cause 
her to look around in alarm, until the 
sight of Mother Lachange shoving her 
bread into the out-door oven, or Pierre 
coming up from the river with a load of 
fish, would bring her fancy back again to 
earth. 

“ I seem to be two persons,” she would 
tell the curd's mother. “ The French 
Marie is a happy girl, who never cares 
what is beyond the mountains ; but there 
is another.” 

“ I like best the French Marie,” the 
sweet old lady would answer. “ She is 
the fortunate one ; she is the good child, 
who does not question why le bon Dieu 
left her here with the fisher-people. The 
fine folk would not have her sick mother ; 
they would have let the little child starve. 
It was the poor fisherman who was her 
friend. Yes, I like best the French 
Marie.” 

The journey down the strange river 
until it poured its black waters into the 
St. Lawrence, was not so very novel to 


Two Paths . 


33 


Marie. There is a strange monotony to 
those high walls, which reach up so far 
towards the sky, as if granite mountains 
had been split in twain in some giant’s 
rough play. She knew the dark river 
well, and had visited every inlet and cove 
for miles in her own small canoe of birch 
bark. As to the steamer — why, it had 
come three times a week to St. Gene- 
vieve every summer since she could re- 
member, with its load of Englishmen, 
bent on hunting or fishing ; its butterfly 
women, who sought health or a new sen- 
sation among those Northern hills; or 
tourists, who just gazed, and went away. 
It was when morning came, and the 
broad St. Lawrence was spread out be- 
fore the eyes of the simple girl, that she 
began to realize what a small part of the 
broad earth was shut in by the Lauren- 
tian chain, and that every stroke of the 
wheel took her farther away from those 
who had loved her and succored her when 
all but God seemed to forget. 

There was so much to see in Quebec 
that she saw but little. Her chief 
thought was that in some cruel way the 
quaint city had swallowed Pierre’s say- 


34 


Two Paths. 


ings. When they took the railway train, 
and her first amazement was over, her old 
self-reliance all came back. The passen- 
gers gazed at her ; some, perhaps, won- 
dering at that high-bred face, framed in 
the cap of a nurse; others, looking just 
for the pure delight that sweet counte- 
nances always give to artistic eyes. But 
she no more heeded the glances than she 
would the leaves which shook in the 
March wind, or the squirrels which ran 
across her path as she brought the cow 
safely home. Madame Picard had 
budded better than she knew, both by 
example and precept ; and it was her 
friend and pupil who looked and acted 
the lady ; it was plump Mrs. Thompson’s 
flushed face upon which the vulgarity of 
newly acquired wealth had written its 
tell-tale lines. 

Marie had no especial duties to per- 
form on the journey, except to answer 
the children when they crawled into her 
lap with their eager questions ; for a 
stout German had their physical well- 
being in charge. They, however, with the 
fickleness common to their years, had 
repudiated, tbe stprdy Gretchen, who 


Two Paths . 


35 


tearfully threatened to give warning as 
soon as their journey was at an end. 
The little ones were as unlike as possi- 
ble : Stanley, aggressive and imperti- 
nent ; Bella, timid and clinging. Our 
young traveller saw that, as regarded 
the boy, at least, she was likely to earn 
all the shining dollars that were to help 
Pierre through the winter. 

Their train moved into the great sta- 
tion at New York very early in the 
morning ; — so early that the dignified 
man in top-boots who met them, had a 
most forbidding expression upon his face, 
at having his comfortable sleep interfered 
with. Marie thought him some distin- 
guished family friend, until, to her sur- 
prise, he grasped the impedimenta of 
travel, and Stanley began to call him 
“ Old Thomas/’ and kick his plump calves, 
unrebuked by the fond mother. 



Now began a life which was, in some 
ways, a great change for the simply 


Two Paths . 


3 6 

reared girl ; in others, just a continua- 
tion of the beautiful years during which 
she had run about the Northern hills, or 
guided her canoe on the wild Northern 
river. Nothing could harm her, for she 
carried a talisman in the holy religion 
which was the greater part of her exist- 
ence. And then, had she not promised 
to go back? “Je reviendrai /” she wrote 
on a little slip of paper, which she shut 
into the prayer-book. She heard the 
words above the roar of the city’s streets, 
and they always closed the letters to 
those whom she fondly termed her own 
people. 

" It is strange,” she would write, "and 
it is wonderful, this city, which never 
sleeps; — but I will go back.” Or, "They 
are very good to me, though perhaps they 
do not understand me ; and I believe 
the children love me. One could look 
out here forever and see something 
new. The world is larger than I 
thought; — but I will go back.” 

Always that. Above the clatter of the 
orchestra, when duty called upon her to 
take charge of the children at some gay 
entertainment ; above the murmur of 


Two Paths . 


37 


the city, which, as she said, never sleeps, 
she would hear those words. Sometimes, 
at night, when she could not rest, she 
would look from the window of the fine 
nursery, out over the square, where the 
electric stars twinkled, carriages with 
fair freight would roll along, pedestrians 
would step as quickly and alertly as if it 
were noon, and the noise of the police- 
man’s club would ring against the walls 
like the beating of a great heart. 

“ I like better the still nights at 
home,” she would think. “ O Pierre ! O 
Mother Lachange ! I will go back ! I will 
go back ! ” 

Letters came to her with regularity. 
Pierre, they said, would save a little out 
of the wreck of the bank ; the snow had 
come, and the boats had long stopped 
running; Fanchon was down with the 
measles, and the black kitten had run 
away. Not a word of their loneliness, 
— not a word of missing the elder daugh- 
ter of the house ; but she read between the 
ill-spelled lines, and knew her friends 
were so silent just for her own sake. 

Madame Picard had no such scruples. 
When her letters would come, sealed 


3§ 


Two Paths. 


1 


with a crest, and directed in a foreign 
hand, Marie knew well what they would 
contain : and she would not read them 
until the children were asleep, and she 
could weep unnoticed. For they would 
say : “ Dear little one : — our hearts break 
with longing for you ! You are kind, 
you are noble, to go away and look 
after those unpleasant children, that you 
may help the good Pierre. But this wil- 
derness is insupportable without you. 
Mother Lachange forgets to smile and 
Pierre, to sing. For myself, — ah, little 
one, the days are long ! Why did we let 
you go ? ” 

'‘Why does she write such things?” 
Marie would sob. “ It is hard enough 
without them.” And then, perchance, 
Mrs. Thompson would call her for a 
look at her toilet as she set out for the 
opera, and the poor child would dry her 
eyes. 

One night her employer noticed the 
big, square envelope, which would not fit 
well into the tiny pocket of Marie’s apron, 
and with her usual lack of courtesy, 
snatched it, and said ; “ It is absurd for 
you to have such aristocratic-looking 


Two Paths . 


39 


letters come to you. Who is there in St. 
Genevieve who sports a crest ? Surely 
not those coarse fisher-people ? ” She got 
no answer — a fact she attributed to 
“ pertness,” her synonym for “ insubor- 
dination, ” But, then, Marie was invalua- 
ble, and it was not safe to rebuke her ; so 
she waddled — there is no other word — off 
to her carriage, serene in her new Worth 
gown, which she was sure imparted to her 
the genuine "grand air.” 

Mrs. Clarence Thompson was, or tried 
to be, a woman of fashion. Her carriage 
was well ordered, her servants the best 
money could procure, her house in an un- 
exceptionable quarter, and she hung on 
to the skirts of the older families by 
reason of the freedom with which she 
spent her large income. She made it 
seem even larger by good management ; 
saving in small things, in order that she 
might be prodigal in great ones. Thus, 
according to her methods, she paid Marie 
the lowest possible amount, until the 
young girl, in her way, rebelled. 

“ I take the place of two,” she said, 
after the German maid had left in high 
dudgeon. “ I am the children’s teacher, 


40 


Two Paths. 


as well as nurse. For myself I would not 
care, — you know, madame, that I would 
not ; but I am working to help my 
people.” 

“ But you have such advantages here ? ” 
suggested Mrs. Thompson. 

“ Pardon, Madame ! It was not for what 
you call advantages that I left my home.” 

So the employer succumbed, knowing 
that such service as Marie rendered 
would be hard to secure at any price ; and 
the poor child had the pleasure of send- 
ing snug- little sums back to the Cana- 
dian hamlet, where winter had already 
locked the swift rivers and stripped the 
green from the landscape ; learning, 
meanwhile, the sweet lesson that labor 
for those we love brings its own bless- 

o 

ing with it. 


V. 

The Indian Summer came, filling the 
air with a golden haze. Even in the 
great city its influence was felt. The 
yellow leaves floated softly down from 


Two Paths . 


4i 


the trees in the square, and the sun shone 
through a veil. One day Marie, as was 
her custom, took her charges to their 
favorite seat in one of the breathing spots 
with which New York is blessed, — a tiny 
park near by their home. 

“ Tell us a story, please said Stanley. 

So she told, not a tale of canoe pad- 
dling, or bear trapping, this time, but the 
sad one of the Acadian peasants. 

“ It was Indian Summer then,” she said, 
“just as it is now; but they called it the 
Summer of All Saints, because it usually 
came near that feast — ” 

Suddenly Stanley’s attention, which the 
poorest story could always enchain, was 
diverted. 

“ If there isn’t Mr. Atkinson !” he cried, 
jumping from his seat and going to meet 
a tall, white-haired man, who lifted him 
from the ground and kissed him. Then 
Bella followed her brother, and was treated 
in the same way. The stranger was 
evidently a close family friend. 

“ This is our nurse,” explained Stanley, 
who was as yet oblivious of the distinctions 
of caste. 

Mr. Atkinson lifted his hat and bowed 


42 


Tivo Paths . 


as if she had been a duchess. He was a 
gentleman of the old school, now so sadly 
going out of fashion. 

“ He’s been away about a million 
miles,” said Stanley, in an aside ; then 
aloud : “ Mr. Atkinson, when did you 
come back ?” 

“ Only last night,” he answered. “ Are 
your mother and father well ?” 

“ Yes, sir; they’re well. Mamma is al- 
ways at parties, and papa at the bank. 
Did you bring me the magic-lantern ?” 

“ I’ll drop in at dinner-time and tell 
you/’ replied Mr. Atkinson, smiling. “ I 
must go now.” He waved his hand to 
the children, gave a furtive look at Marie, 
and hurried on. 

“He’s awfully nice,” said Stanley; 
“ and terribly rich. He brings us bonbons . 
He lives over there, three doors from us 
— but please go on with the story. You’d 
got to the place where the English burned 
Grandpa.” 

"Grand Pre,” corrected Marie, laugh- 
ing, going on to tell the rest, and for- 
getting the chance encounter with the 
kind stranger ; — the finest gentleman, she 
thought, that she had ever seen. She 


Two Paths . 


A3 


was reminded of it later by Mrs. 
Thompson. 

“You may bring the children in to 
dessert, Marie,” she ordered. 

They surely needed no bringing, being 
perfectly well able to take themselves ; 
but it was necessary that good form be 
observed. It was considered proper in 
Mrs. Thompson’s circle to have the sleepy 
children brought in by a white-capped 
bonne at the end of the dinner. 

Mr. Atkinson seemed to find something 
interesting in the face of the slim girl 
who pared the oranges for the children ; 
but she did not know it. She was wonder- 
ing what little Fanchon would think of 
the great golden balls, and fancying how 
the sight of them would make the baby 
crow and laugh with joy. 

“When I go home,” she resolved, “I 
will carry at least a dozen.” Then Mrs. 
Thompson’s high-pitched voice broke in 
upon her reverie. 

“ Mr. Atkinson will take the children 
to drive to-morrow, Marie. Be sure that 
Bella wears her warm coat.” 

The leaves were falling in Central 
Park as they rolled along in its pleasant 


44 


Two Paths . 


shade the next day; Marie and Bella 
facing Mr. Atkinson and Stanley. 

“ You just get her to tell you a story,” 
commanded Stanley. “ She knows a 
hundred. She lives where we went last 
summer; up the Saguenay. She knows 
all about shooting, and how to catch trout 
and boats — and everything.” 

“Are you French, my child?” asked 
the owner of the carriage, kindly. 

Marie was confused at her unsolicited 
prominence in the conversation. “ I — I 
do not know,” she answered, faintly. 

Now this was a most extraordinary 
answer to a very natural and civil ques- 
tion, and Mr. Atkinson plainly betrayed 
his surprise. 

“ I do not know who my real people 
are,” she went on. “ I was adopted by 
French people when my mother died. 
She was a stranger.” 

Stanley stared. This was more en- 
chanting to him than any story of bears 
or Acadians. 

“Tell us more about it,” the boy de- 
manded, in his imperious way. 

“ When we get back,” she said swiftly, 
in French. 


Two Paths . 


45 


“ No, now!” he insisted. “ Make her 
tell the rest, Mr. Atkinson. And Marie, 
you needn’t talk French before him. It 
isn’t polite; for he hates everything and 
everybody French. I’ve heard mamma 
say so.” 

" I am not so fierce as he would make 
me out ; and to-morrow, when you bring 
the children to see my new pictures, per- 
haps, Miss — I do not know your name.” 

“ My name is Marie Lachange.” 

“ Well, Miss Lachange, perhaps Stanley 
can coax you to tell the pretty story then.” 
“He calls her 'Miss Lachange’!” 
laughed the little fellow, in great glee. 
“ How ridiculous it is to call Marie that ! ” 
So great was the difference in their 
ages that Mr. Atkinson’s interest in the 
young girl was not remarked upon ; in- 
deed, Mrs. Thompson was only too glad 
to tell him what she knew about her — 
which was not very much — as they sat 
by the library fire that evening, and Mr. 
Thompson dozed near by in his comfort- 
able chair. 

“ I am not sentimental, you will admit, 
Ellen,” said the guest; "but I can’t get 
her out of my mind. It was up in that 


4 6 


Two Paths. 


Northern country that poor Mary died. 
There is but a chance — ” 

Mrs. Thompson was getting excited. 
“ Mr. Atkinson, you do not mean — you 
cannot mean — ” 

Mr. Thompson awoke, then fell asleep 
again. 

“ I do mean that my poor girl left a 
baby up there among those peasants ; 
and they were, God knows, better to her 
than her own flesh and blood. They 
made inquiries, too, in their innocent 
way ; and these inquiries, I remember, 
came from St. Genevieve. It is not a 
common name ; and then the resem- 
blance — the eyes and hair, even the 
voice. Ellen, something tells me that 
this nurse of yours is my grandchild.” 

Mr. Thompson was wide awake now, 
and his wife was fairly gasping. 

“ Will you call her down stairs ? ” 
asked the old gentleman. “ Then we 
will know all about it.” He tried to be 
calm, to control his excitement and agita- 
tion, and to reason like the philosopher 
he had always been. 

Marie came. She had taken off her 
cap for the night, and forgotten to re- 


Two Paths . 


47 


place it at the unusual summons. Her 
hair tumbled upon her shoulders, as it 
had done when she had ^one sin^in^ 
down to the meadow for the cow ; and 
she had thrown a white shawl about her 
that had long lain in the lavender-scented 
trunk in the Canadian garret. 

Mr. Atkinson gave one look. “ My 
God,” he cried, “ it is my child again !” 

What scene was this ? What maun- 
derings pf an infirm old man had they 
brought her down-stairs to witness ? 

“ Marie, ” said Mrs. Thompson, with 
decision, wishing to bring matters to a 
climax, for the situation was growing 
strained ; “this gentleman wishes to know 
a little of your history. Would you 
mind telling him ?” 

“ There is nothing I would not wish to 
tell,” she answered, respectfully. And 
she related in simple words, dropping her 
voice as she spoke of the dead, the tale 
of her infancy ; of her mother’s sad death 
among strange people, of her own adop- 
tion, of her subsequent life, and of her 
reluctant going out into the world that 
she might help Pierre, who had done so 
much for her. “ They never could find 


4 8 


Two Paths. 


my own family,” she concluded “ I think 
they did not wish- to be found.” 

“Was there no mark upon your 
mother’s linen?” asked the old gentle- 
man, tremblingly. 

“Just the letters M. F. A. We had 
them put on the little cross in the grave- 
yard.” 

“ Her name was Mary Frances,” he 
said, fairly shaking now. “ My dear, it 
may not be pleasant news for you, but I 
think I am your grandfather.” 


VI. 

Marie had often imagined what she 
would say if, in the unknown world be- 
yond the St. Lawrence River, she should 
meet any one who, by a tie of blood, 
belonged to her. Now it had happened ; 
and her high-flown sentences were for- 
gotten. She simply put out her slim 
hand, no longer brown from berry-pick- 
ing. Mr. Atkinson would have ventured 
a more paternal greeting, but she drew 
back. She would have no caresses from 


Two Paths . 


49 


a person who had left her to the charity 
of others ; even if he were her grand- 
father, of which she was not at all sure. 

“ There can be no doubt,” said the old 
man ; all his dignity relinquished as he 
pleaded for recognition. “ I am the one 
to whom you naturally belong ; for your 
father died just a week after your 
mother. But I will not ask you to care 
for me ; only forgive me and bear with 

n 

me. 

“ Pardon me, Monsieur,” answered 
Marie ; “ I do not belong to you, but to 
Pierre. I am legally of another nation. 
Other countries have laws as well as this, 
and I have got on very well so far with- 
out grandfathers.” 

It was a bitter speech, but all the con- 
centrated indignation of years seemed 
to boil within hen Mr. Atkinson shud- 
dered as though struck a blow. Then 
he arose. 

“ I will go now,” he said. “ To-morrow 
you may see things differently ; and then 
you can find out the truth, if you care 
to. But I will not thrust a relationship 
upon you.” 

Marie noticed how feeble he had 


5 © 


Two Paths. 


seemed to grow within a. few minutes, 
and she felt a sort of tenderness toward 
him, as if she had found in her path a 
bird with a broken wing. 

“ I was rude,” she said, the color com- 
ing and going in her soft, dark cheeks. 
“ It is my fault to be too out-spoken. 
But, you will admit, it must be startling 
to have some one you know only a very 
little say, ‘I am your grandfather.’” 

At this they all smiled, and a faint 
light shone in Mr. Atkinson’s fine old 
face ; but he did not extend his hand as 
he said good-night. 

“ What a foolish girl you are, to be 
sure!” announced Mrs. Thompson, when 
the visitor had gone. “ There can be no 
doubt about the matter; and why I 
never suspected it before I don’t know. 
I can remember Mary Atkinson quite 
well, though I was but a little girl when 
she ran off and married that Frenchman.” 
“Frenchman?” asked Marie, in sur- 
prise. 

“Yes, he was a Frenchman and a 
Romanist ; and her father never could 
abide either.” 

“ What is a Romanist ?” 


Two Paths . 


5i 


“Why, you are one yourself, you little 
goose f Catholic, then, if that suits you 
better.” 

“ And my mother?” 

“She became one too, and her father 
shut his door in her face. She wrote to 
him after that, but he would not answer 
or hear her name spoken. Then his 
wife died, and the other children. This 
house has been like his own home ; it 
was my father’s, you know. They were 
great friends; but not even father dared 
to speak of poor Mary. He tried it 
once, and your grandfather interrupted 
him, saying, ‘ She is dead. She died in 
Canada:’ and he changed the subject.” 
“Then he must have known. The 
advertisements went everywhere.” 

“ I can’t say as to that. But, my dear, 
you must retire now.” 

There was already perceptible in Mrs. 
Thompson’s manner toward the young 
stranger within her gates a very great 
change ! Miss Aubrey, the granddaugh- 
ter of a man reputed to be a millionaire, 
was a different personage from little 
Marie of the Saguenay, her children’s 
nurse. 


5 2 


Two Paths. 


Poor Marie could hardly wait to get 
to her room, the tiny chamber which 
opened out of the nursery. The children 
were sleeping in their white beds, breath- 
ing regularly and softly. She stopped 
and kissed them. “God bless them!” 
she said, under her breath. She felt that 
the time was coming when they would 
cease to be to her what they had been so 
long. She was very fond of them ; and 
Stanley, from love of her, had grown to 
be much more gentle and obedient. 

With the same unquestioning faith 
that had made her strong through all her 
young life, Marie knelt and poured her 
perplexities and troubles before the 
Blessed Mother of Good Counsel. Then, 
not thinking to sleep, after all the strange 
excitement of the evening, she sat down 
by the window, her rosary in her hand. 
The noise of the street, grown familiar 
now, soothed her ; the wind had changed, 
and the soft air of the Indian Summer 
night stole in and bathed her cheeks, 
upon which the tears had dried. She 
laid her face against the back of the 
comfortable chair and slept until the rays 
of the sun awakened her. When her 


Two Paths . 


53 


duties with the children were over for the 
morning she asked permission to go out 
for a little while. 

“ Do whatever you like,” said her 
employer; then, her curiosity getting 
the better of her, '‘Where are you 
going?” 

Marie hesitated, but finally answered, 
politely: “ I wish to speak to a friend of 
our acre's. I was to go to him for advice 
if I needed it. You see, this may not 
be so — this that the gentleman says, that 
he is my grandfather. It is hard for me 
to see the right way.” 

What was superstition in little Marie 
was devotion in Miss Aubrey ; yet Mrs. 
Thompson felt called upon to administer 
a slight rebuke. 

o 

“ There are others to give you ad- 
vice — Mr. Thompson or I.” 

She was talking to the walls. Marie 
was flying out of the front door and 
down the street. If the cur £ s friend 
was not in she would wait to hear from 
• St. Genevieve. He was not in, and she 
let that fact decide.. And until she heard 
from her good friends, she thought, she 
had only to go on teaching the little 


54 


Two Paths. 


ones, and saying her prayers. Then she 
went back to the house, and wrote to 
Madame Picard, bidding her let Pierre 
and his mother know of the strange 
events. “ And tell them,” the short letter 
said at its close, “ that a hundred grand- 
fathers could not make me love them 
less, and that I will go back.” 

The letter was long in reaching St. 
Genevieve ; for there were now no boats 
gliding swiftly up the Saguenay with the 
tide, and the towns near the head of nav- 
igation were as isolated from the bustle of 
the world as snow and ice could make 
them. But when at last the missive 
reached Madame Picard, and was read 
by her to the listening family in the stone 
house across the field, it brought much 
consternation. Not that they believed 
that the new ties would bind her, and 
make her forget the old ones ; not that 
they feared she would fail to keep her 
sweet promise, so freely given ; but she 
was far away, and grandfathers had, per- 
haps, in that other country, so near and 
yet so far, rights of which they knew 
nothing. 

There were many and varying opin- 


Two Paths . 


55 


ions among the villagers when the news 
spread. 

“’Tis plain to see,” observed one, 
upon whom the plain-speaking Marie 
had never looked with favor, “that she 
has found relations more to her mind.” 

“Oh,” said another, shrugging her 
shoulders, “do you not know that she 
said she would come back again, rela- 
tions or no relations? And do you 
think the child dislikes the truth as much 
as you do, Annette Campau?” 

So the contention went on, and 
Mother Lachange believed and hoped 
and prayed. 

“ They know you will do what is right, 
little one,” wrote Madame Picard. 
“ And be not too severe with the good 
grandfather. We must forgive, you 
know, if we hope to be forgiven. And 
my son thinks that he can not compel 
you to do anything against your will ; 
that your true guardians in the law are 
those whom God gave you when the 
grandfather did not care. And Pierre, 
too, says you must try and be kind to 
Monsieur Atkinson. But when the 
roses bloom (oh, there are so few roses 


56 


Two Paths. 


in this cold land !) we all know you will 
come back.” 

Meanwhile the acquaintance between 
Mr. Atkinson and his neighbor’s hireling 
(for Marie would not consent to sunder 
the old relations) was not progressing very 
rapidly. He did not intrude his presence 
upon her; he never claimed her atten- 
tion as a right ; and this course slowly 
had its effect. Gradually she came to 
look for the grave old man, and to miss 
him when he did not come. There 
could be no doubt as to their relation- 
ship : that had at once been settled be- 
yond question ; but she remained as she 
had been, the children’s nurse and 
teacher. 

There were many things in common 
between the young girl and her grand- 
father. He needed help in some scien- 
tific studies, which she, reading the old 
French books to which he referred, could 
give. They both loved music, too ; and 
had many afternoons, shared by the 
children, when they listened to some of 
the best music that the great city 
afforded. The caps and aprons were 
now laid aside in public, and strangers 


Two Paths. 


57 


often wondered what the gray-haired man 
and the girl were to each other, and 
what the children were to both. 

It was Christmas morning, and Marie 
had crept out of the silent house at five 
o’clock to go to the first Mass of the 
glorious feast. Never since coming to 
New York had she relaxed one of the 
devotional habits of her childhood. The 
wayside crosses and the village festivals, 
when each one’s patron saint was in turn 
honored, had been left behind ; but in 
their place she had seen the fervor of 
many thousands, who sweetened the 
bitterness of hard lives by visits to the 
holy places where sanctuary lamps 
twinkled day and night. '‘God,” she 
said, “ is here as well as at home ; and 
He will help me to know the right way. 
Best of all she loved to go to a church, 
not large, but beautiful as a jewel, where 
a statue of Our Lady reminded her of 
the one which, hundreds of feet above 
the black waters of the Saguenay, stands 
in storm and sunshine, as if blessing 
those who trust themselves to the mercy 
of the waves. In this church she knelt 
that Christmas morning, offering her 


58 


Two Paths. 


Communion for her simple peasant 
people, locked fast in their winter home. 

When she returned to the house, Mrs. 
Thompson was waiting. “Your grand- 
father has sent for you,” she said. “ He 
is ill.” 

Marie’s first impulse was to say, “ My 
mother was ill, and did he care?” But 
the words died on her tongue, and her 
second thoughts were worthy her better 
nature. Was he not, in spite of his 
wealth, a lonely old man ? And what 
had he on earth but her, this grand- 
daughter, who must forgive him, as she 
would be forgiven ? She went to him at 
once. 

“ Grandfather,” she said, “ here I am.” 
She had never called him that before, 
and his faded eyes brightened. 

“ I should not have sent for you so 
early, my child,” he said. 

“ Oh, it is not early for Christmas 
morning ! I have already been to Mass. 
And I wish you a happy Christmas ! ” 

The light in his eyes faded again. 
Was the old story to be repeated ? Was 
what he thought a delusion, and named 
the “ popish superstition,” again to come 


Two Paths . 


59 

between him and what he loved best on 
earth ? 


VIL 

Marie went to work at once, doing all 
those little offices from love and duty 
which no servant can do for money ; 
opening the shutters that the brief win- 
ter sunshine might stream in ; bringing 
flowers from the conservatory, and placing 
them where their fragrance and beauty 
could reach the invalid ; smoothing the 
thin hair away from the fine old face ; and 
all the time keeping up the pleasant 
chatter, with its quaint accent, of which 
he had become so fond. He was not 
very ill, although after a wakeful night 
he had fancied himself at death’s door ; 
and revived speedily under the pleasant 
treatment of his nurse, finding himself 
shortly ensconced before the grate in his 
cheery library. 

“ I have not had such a Christmas in 
many years,” he said, gaily. 

“ I think Christmas is always delight- 


6o 


Two Paths. 


ful,” Marie responded. “We used to 
wear our snow-shoes when we went to 
Mass. You should see our snow-shoes, 
grandfather ! ” (it had become so easy to 
call him that.) “All summer they hang 
in a row in the garret — large and small, 
down to the baby’s. And the weather ! 
You would think it terrible, but we did 
not mind it ; and often, when I was little, 
Madame Picard and I would go on the 
big sled with the curd to visit his mission 
stations. Sometimes the snow would be 
drifted so that we could not see the 
fences, and could only follow the lines of 
cedar bushes ; and many times H the curd 
would have to get out and push the sled, 
when the fat pony could not get over the 
worst places. Once a great snow-storm 
came on, and we might have been lost if 
some lumbermen had not passed near. 
They were going into camp for the night, 
and you cannot think what music their 
- songs were to us. They were voyageurs , 
who fished and hunted in summer and 
went to the lumber camps in winter. 
They would rather be poor and free up 
there than what you call ‘ civilized ’ here, 
grandfather. And they are good men 


Two Paths . 


61 

mostly, though so rough; and they were 
very respectful to the cure, and asked for 
his blessing. We stayed at the camp all 
night, and in the morning Father Picard 
set up his altar and said Mass. You can- 
not think how strange it was to see all the 
bright ornaments and clean vestments in 
that place. The men were all kind, if 
they were not very clean ; and when we 
started again they made us take their 
warmest furs. And, then, in summer ! 
Oh, you should see my country in sum- 
mer ! ” 

“ Your country ! ” exclaimed Mr. Atkin- 
son, giving the fire a petulant poke. 
She knew the meaning of that frown 
between his eyes. 

"Yes, my country. Why not? For 
myself, I hardly know what I am, being 
the Queen’s subject with a French father 
and a nice Yankee grandfather. How- 
ever, the Saguenay region is my country. 
But where was I ? Oh, yes. The sum- 
mer is not long, but each day is pieced 
out by the twilight ; and then we would 
take our canoes up the shore, and run the 
rapids coming back. I don’t suppose 
you ever ran a rapid in your life, did you 


62 


Two Paths. 


grandfather?” (As Mr, Atkinson did 
not seem to heed her question, she went 
on.) “ And the berry camps ? We wore 
our big straw-hats, and had our berry 
boxes strapped to our shoulders ; for one 
had to climb the cliffs. And while we 
worked — though it was really more play 
than work — our mothers sat by the camp- 
fire, knitting and keeping the coffee warm. 
Going home at night we would all sing, 
sometimes hymns to Our Lady, some- 
times boat songs. This was one ” — and 
she trilled a little chanson. (The servants 
listened in the hall without, and the old 
housekeeper wiped her eyes, having sung 
that song herself long before.) “Oh, 
yes!” concluded Marie, “the summers 
were most sweet, but I think I liked best 
the winters. Oh, that is such a beautiful 
white country in winter !” 

“ It makes me shiver just to hear about 
it. Do you like it better than this?” 

“ Far, far better,” she answered, won- 
dering how any one in his right mind could 
make the comparison. “ Perhaps you 
will come and see it after I go back.” 

He frowned. “ If you entertain any 
thought of going back to that heathenish 


Two Paths . 


6 3 


place, please keep them from me, and 
forget them as soon as possible ; for you 
must not go back, my child.” 

“ Not go back! Why, I promised. 
We do not break promises in St. Gene- 
vieve. And, besides, I wish to go back ; 
and, besides that ” — here her grand- 
father’s own unconquerable spirit spoke 
in her — “ I intend to go back ! ” 

“ But I will not allow it, my dear,” he 
said, roused in his turn. 

“Not allow it!” she replied, her dark 
eyes opening wide. “Not allow it! 
Pierre will allow it, and that is enough. 
He is my father in the law, you know ; 
and he is such a good man,” she went on, 
trying to assuage the pain her words had 
caused. “ He has told me often of the 
night we got there, my mother and I ; 
and afterward — but it was others who 
told me that — he went without many 
things that I might have comforts. He 
said he must try and make up to me for 
losing my mother.” 

The old housekeeper passed through 
the room, listening and looking askance 
at the fair-haired girl with the dark eyes, 
who seemed to interest her master to 


64 


Two Paths. 


such a wonderful degree. But Marie did 
not notice her; or noticing, did not care. 

“We must have some sort of an un- 
derstanding,” said the old man, as she 
fixed the cushions so that his head might 
rest more comfortably. “ At least you 
can come and make me a visit.” 

“ But, really, grandfather — ” 

“ There is no ‘really’ about it. When 
you are in that confounded Canada, I 
suppose that Frenchman has some 
authority ; but in New York you are my 
grandchild, and my house is the only 
proper place for you.” 

He was getting excited and nervous 
again, and the young girl humored him ; 
sending to Mrs. Thompson’s for her few 
belongings, and sitting in state behind the 
coffee-urn after the early Christmas din- 
ner. 

It was the old story repeated. As the 
days wore on, what had been a duty, be- 
came a pleasure. She was surrounded 
with an atmosphere of luxury, whose 
seductions were hard to withstand. Her 
clothes were pronounced ridiculous, and 
she was taken in hand by a modiste in a 
fashionable shop on Fifth Avenue; while 


Tzvo Paths . 


6 5 


the old blue gowns were hidden away, to 
be wept over at intervals when she was 
alone. And, the truth must be told, 
those hours of wild weeping were growing 
fewer. It was easy to lead that sweet 
new existence : to sit with her kind grand- 
father in a box at the Metropolitan, 
watching the mimic life of the stage and 
the real life in the audience; to go now 
and then to elegant mansions, where the 
refinements of wealth made something 
poetic of the art of dining ; to buy all the 
bright new books, and see all the rarest 
paintings ; and to wear the dainty gar- 
ments to which she so soon became 
habituated. The days had wings. This 
was the reality ; it was the old life 
in Canada that was now the dream. 
The poison was entering her soul, and 
her grandfather knew it. He did not 
call it poison — oh, no ! — but he was fully 
aware of what his kindness, and persist- 
ence, and wariness were doing. He did 
not openly interfere with Marie’s religious 
life, trusting that time would gradually 
change that. And so it might, had not 
the child carried an antidote for moral 
poison safe in her heart — her love of 


66 


Tzvo Paths . 


truth, and her devotion to the Blessed 
Mother, whose arms are always out- 
stretched to bless and protect her children. 

Marie had her mother’s own room, 
whose furnishings were so touchingly out 
of date, never having been changed since 
its mistress chose between God and 
Mammon; and there she went to tell the 
beads of the plain little rosary that 
Mother Lachange had given her on the 
day of her First Communion. She had a 
true friend in the old priest who had been 
asked by the of St. Genevieve to 
look after the girl who was going out 
* into the world among strangers. Father 
Sinsier was a busy man, but he could 
always stop for a brief chat, or to give a 
word of counsel. Unfortunately, how- 
ever, he did not apprehend the insidious 
danger which threatened Marie ; or, if he 
realized it, he did not fail to trust her. 
She was so brave and true, that “surely,” 
he thought, “ no harm can come from a 
winter with her grandfather; and in the 
spring the child will be going home.” 
He had heard from his friend that 
Pierre’s mother was ailinor. 

Mr Atkinson, meanwhile, was con- 


Two Paths . 


67 


cerned with his granddaughter’s educa- 
tion. He procured a governess, who was 
to act as chaperon as well ; and requested 
her to undertake the proper moulding of 
Miss Aubrey’s mind and manners. But 
in some mysterious way, they seemed to 
have been already trained; and Miss 
Brown came, almost in tears, to her 
employer. Some of the things the lady 
thought proper for the child to learn, she 
would not listen to, and in some branches 
she seemed to wish to instruct her 
teacher. This was Miss Brown’s com- 
plaint. 

Mr. Atkinson sought his granddaugh- 
ter. “ What is this I hear of you, my 
dear?” he asked. “Miss Brown says 
you laugh at her.” 

“ Oh, I am afraid I did. Who could 
help it ? Her history is so funny ! And 
it is not true, some of it — not one 
bit true ! ” The little foot came down 
very decidedly upon the floor as she 
spoke. 

“ May I ask how you came to be wise 
enough to judge between true history 
and false ? ” 

She did not notice the sarcasm. “Oh, 


68 


7 wo Paths . 


Madame Picard taught me. She knows 
every bit of true history that ever was 
written, I am sure. And she told me all 
about the saints; and how to name a 
flower that you never saw before ; and 
how the stars are set together in little 
families. She does know so much, grand- 
father — even some Greek ; and about the 
grand cathedrals, and the pictures in the 
art galleries across the ocean. And Miss 
Brown’s French — I could not make it 
out, and she was angry, and said all the 
Canadians talked a patois — oh, grand- 
father, it was so droll ! ” 

“ My child, you had better take breath. 
I am sure I do not wonder that poor 
Miss Brown was disconcerted.” 

"You had better let her stay so, grand- 
father. I don’t wish to learn things. ” 

“ What in Heaven’s name do you wish, 
you perverse child ? ” 

" In the first place, that you would speak 
with reverence of Heaven ; then, I would 
like to buy a beautiful marble cross, as 
white as snow, for my mother’s grave ; 
and I would like to give Pierre a new fur 
coat and another cow. I cannot think 
of anything else just now.” 


Two Paths . 


69 


Miss Brown was sent away, and no 
further attempt was made to educate 
Marie. 


VIII. 

Spring came again. The grass in the 
square was green ; smart new clothes 
were seen on the avenue; and a pair of 
robins, fancying themselves in the coun- 
try, were building a nest in one of the 
elms. 

“When is your birthday, Mary?” 
asked Mr. Atkinson one May morn- 
ing (he would never give her the French 
form of her name). 

A shadow flitted over her face as 
she answered : “ How can I know, grand- 
father — I who never have birthdays?” 

He saw his blunder, and said, con- 
fusedly and hurriedly, trying to undo his 
words: “Of course not; I quite forgot. 
But I have it set down somewhere. 
Your mother wrote to me soon after you 
were born, and I — may God forgive 

1 ” 

me 1 


7o 


Two Paths . 


“He will forgive,” said Marie, pityingly. 
“ Even I have forgiven — almost,” the 
last word under her breath. 

The date was found, and her birthday 
celebrated as she wished. She would 
have no gifts, but asked instead that 
some fruit and flowers be sent to the 
Sisters’ hospital, of which Father Sensier 
was chaplain. Mr. Atkinson, amazed at 
himself beyond measure, lent the light 
of his majestic old face to the feast 
which followed. He would make no 
further concessions to Mary’s religious 
scruples, he thought. The time was 
approaching when she must be told 
that the quicker she got rid of her 
odious superstitions the better ; he 
would not have her under the domin- 
ion of those false ideas with which she 
had been imbued by semi-barbarians. 
He wished to give an entertainment, 
and introduce her formally to society. 
But she protested, feeling that it would 
commit her to a path in which she 
miorht not tread. 

o 

The letters which came from Madame 
Picard brought no good news. Pierre 
was doing better, it was true ; but his 


Two Paths . 


7i 


mother was ailing. “She is trying to 
live until you and the summer come, 
dear little one ! ” the words ran on. 
Poor Madame Picard ! She did not 
say how she herself, longed for her 
young friend. 

Marie was silent and thoughtful after 
that letter came. She felt that a crisis 
was near, and questioned herself stead- 
ily and remorselessly that night in the 
pretty chamber where her mother had 
dreamed and prayed before her. There 
were two paths, Marie knew ; and — she 
would be frank with herself — treading 
one would be like strolling through a 
garden where the flowers made a carpet 
for her feet ; walking in the other would 
be climbing a rugged mountain ; but it 
would be going towards heaven. And 
the former — she dared not think of the 
pitfalls beneath the rose petals. She 
took a little book of devotion from her 
table, and opened it at these words : 
“ If two roads lie before thee, and thou 
knowest not which to follow, choose that 
which is fullest of thorns.” Hard words, 
perhaps, but God had sent them. She 
pondered no longer. The way was clear, 


72 


Two Paths . 


and her mind made up even before the 
morning's mail brought another letter. 
“ She is failing,” it said ; “she cannot live 
a week. Come, little one, and receive 
her blessing.” 

There was no cowardly parleying with 
her conscience now, as she changed her 
soft, pretty garments for those she had 
worn so long. The collar of the rough 
gown chafed her throat, but she did not 
care. Then she went down to the 
library to break the news of her going 
away to her grandfather. 


IX. 

Mr. Atkinson was deep in the peru- 
sal of the North American Review , but 
turned his head as Marie, with a heav- 
ier tread than usual, entered the room. 

“ Grandfather,” she said, coming to 
the case in hand at once, “I am going 
home.” 

He looked up, bewildered. Could 
there be a taint of madness in her blood? 
What meant that coarse gown, made in 


Two Paths . 


73 


that extraordinary fashion, and those 
heavy shoes? He would be gentle with 
her. 

“ My dear,” he said, placidly, “are you 
going to a masquerade?” 

“ 1 am going home. I have a letter. 
See ! Mother Lachange is dying, and she 
wishes only to see me.” The soft voice 
faltered. “ I am going to-day, and I 
have put on the old clothes. She would 
not know me in the new ones.” 

“You are not going to do this ridicu- 
lous thing, Mary. I forbid it.” 

“ I supposed you would,” she answered, 
sadly. “ I would like to obey you, but I 
must go ; and I came to say good-bye.” 

“ I'll not have you saying good-bye. 
You are not going anywhere, except to 
Mrs. King’s dinner. You are quite the 
fashion ; they call you unique. The roses 
will be here at five o’clock. Now run 
away, and I will finish this article. It 
beats the mischief what arguments this 
fellow advances.” 

“ It is no use, grandfather. When the 
roses come, I shall be gone. I found out 
about the trains in the paper.” 

The old man threw the Reviezv on the 






74 Two Paths. 

floor and burst out : “ Confound it, 

Mary! You’ll drive me into another ill- 
ness. I tell you, you shall not go !” 

She only shook her head. 

'‘Don’t you owe me anything ?” he 
stormed. 

“ I owe you much, but I owe them 
more.” 

“ I will see the British Consul,” he 
continued, “ and have those beggars 
brought to time.” 

“ They are not the beggars; it was I 
who was the beggar when they took me 
in ; and, grandfather — ” 

“You need not ‘grandfather’ me if 
you will not heed a word I say.” 

“And,” she went on, “if, since I have 
been here, you have done much for me, I 
have tried to do something for you. You 
said, you know, that my nursing cured 
you. But if I have seemed happy, too 
happy, I think my heart was true to them 
all the while. And now I am going 
back.” 

Then came from his lips such bitter 
words as would ill suit these pages. He 
bade her begone, and she took him at 
his word. The stout little shoes clattered 


7 wo Paths . 


75 


over the polished floor, and the disap- 
pointed old man took up the Review with 
trembling hands, not seeing one word 
before him. 

Marie went over to take leave of the 
Thompson children. Their mother was 
out. 

“ What have you got on those old 
clothes for?” inquired Stanley, in disgust. 
“ You’re rich now. Mother said you 
could get all Mr. Atkinson’s money^ if 
you played your cards right. I didn’t 
know you knew how to play cards.” 

“ Gi ve this note to your mother, Stan- 
ley ; and you must come to St. Gene- 
vieve when it is warm.” 

The children were perplexed. What 
dreadful thing had happened to drag her 
away? They clung to her gown — her 
old blue gown ; but she put their little 
hands one side. She could not, she 
thought, endure more of these partings. 
Then she kissed them, and telling them 
not to forget the Blessed Lady of whom 
she had taught them, tore herself away. 

That afternoon a young girl, wearing 
a close bonnet, and a homespun gown, 
stepped into the Quebec train, north- 


76 


Two Paths. 


ward bound. She had no more doubts ; 
she knew she was doing right ; yet her 
heart ached for the proud old man who 
had, as he so often said, no one but her, 
and whom she had disobeyed. 

“ Oh, grandfather ! ” she whispered, be- 
hind her veil, “ do you think I have 
given up nothing?” 

She knew what was before her : the 
long, ice-bound winters ; the stone cot- 
tage, with its smell of fish ; the berry-pick- 
ing, and the spinning; but she put those 
things out of her mind, and tried to re- 
member how softly the sun of early sum- 
mer was falling upon her mother’s grave ; 
on the still river, with a beauty like none 
other; and of the quiet church, where 
she must go at once on her arrival, to 
pray God to make her a good girl, and 
to thank Him that she was safe at home 
again. 

She was fortunate in catching the Sag- 
uenay boat at Quebec, and early one 
morning stepped off at St. Genevieve. 
No one was stirring except the men at 
the wharf, the hurrying tide had brought 
the steamer in at an unusual hour. She 
trod the familiar path like a young fawn, 


Two Paths . 


77 


unheeding the comments of tourists who 
were beginning to swarm to the region. 
Pierre saw her coming, and met her. 

o 1 

“ The mother — ?” asked Marie. 

“ Alive, God be thanked ! ” said Pierre, 
in his rough, peasant speech, so sweet 
now, to her ears. 

She went into the house and fell on 
her knees beside the bed. “ I have 
come back ! ” was all she could say. 

“ God be thanked ?” feebly murmured 
the dying woman, in Pierre's own words. 

Marie felt that peace was there where 
people thanked God as freely as they 
drew their breath, and a sweet content 
stole into her soul. The city life was as 
if it had never been. As to her grand- 
father she could only pray for him. 

Mother Lachange lingered until night. 
Her peace with heaven was made, and her 
child was at home again ; so she died a 
happy woman, her hand clasped in 
Marie’s and her lips moving until the end 
in response to the cures prayers. The 
whole community turned out to do her 
honor when the stout arms of her neigh- 
bors bore her to her grave on the hill- 
side. 


78 


Two Paths . 


There was a little council held after 
the burial. 

“ Yes, I have come back to stay,” said 
Marie. " I do not like the world.” 

" But your grandfather ?” 

A tear stole trembling down her 
cheek. 

" I see,” remarked Madame Picard. 
"The grandfather is in your heart to 
stay, and you desolate yourself for him. 

" But I love you all, and I am at 
home. That is enough. And he will 
do without me just as he did before.” 

"And everything will be just as it 
was,” exclaimed the elder lady, "except 
that the poor Mother Lachange is gone, 
and little Pierre is big enough to drive 
the cow ! ” 

" Nothing is ever the same again,” re- 
plied Marie, looking over where the sun- 
shine lay upon two graves. 

"There is the boat! said Pierre. 
Though mothers died, and were buried, 
he must see that the steward had his 
usual supply of trout. The others gazed 
after him, and then, hand in hand, 
strolled down to the landing. The pas- 
sengers crowded on shore, and some, 


Two Paths . 


79 


who had come to stay, mounted the 
quaint vehicles in waiting, and were 
driven to the hotel. Madame Picard felt 
the hand in her own tremble. An old 
man, half a head taller than any one 
about him, stepped off briskly, followed 
by his servant. 

“It is my grandfather!” cried Marie, 
and ran toward him. There was no 
scene, such as the emotional French lady 
expected. Mr. Atkinson acted as if go- 
ing to St. Genevieve were an affair of 
daily occurrence. 

“ Mary,” he said, looking at her black 
dress, “ you were right not to wait for me. 
And what a heavenly place this is ! ” 

Then Madame Picard was duly pre- 
sented, and made one of her state courte- 
sies. Here was a hero of the old fash- 
ion, she thought ; no wonder he had crept 
into the little one’s heart. 

In that “heavenly place” Mr. Atkin- 
son abides to-day. He is always threat- 
ening to go back ; but, excepting for 
brief sojourns which are necessitated by 
business, he never does. On one of 
those flying journeyings he took Marie 
and Madame Picard, the latter going, as 


8o 


Two Paths. 


» 

she said, “ to look at the States.” She 
professed to be pleased with everything, 
but will not admit that New York is like 
Paris, as people have so often declared 
to her. 

Mr. Atkinson has built a pretty cot- 
tage, and from Marie’s own room she 
can see the quiet grave where all that 
is mortal of her mother sleeps, and over 
which there is now the fair white cross 
she longed for. Her grandfather is hap- 
pier than ever before. He has taken a 
great fancy to Pierre, who is always an 
honored guest, and the guide in fishing- 
parties when people come from what 
Marie still calls “ the world ” to visit him. 
Even the winters are all too short; for 
the pretty villa is stored with books, 
new and old, and the art treasures of 
the mansion in Madison Square have 
found their way inside its hospitable 
walls. 

Madame Picard and the owner of that 
house have become fast friends, always 
engaged in some friendly controversy or 
congenial inquiry into scientific problems. 
The dear old lady declares that in time 
she will convert “ Monsieur Grandfather” 


Two Paths . 


8 1 


to the true faith, in which endeavor she 
has our best wishes. 

As to Marie, she feels that the cup of 
life holds no greater joys than she pos- 
sesses. If she has one pleasure greater 
than the others, it is in making the lives 
of the peasantry less hard ; for her grand- 
father attempts no abridgement of her 
charities. Having been so poor, in 
worldly goods, herself, she can feel for 
the poor ; and her soft footstep is known 
far and near in the humbler cottages of 
the parish. She does not always give 
money, for it is not always needed ; many 
times it is only a little love she leaves 
behind, out of that wealth of love for all 
who suffer or sorrow, with which her 
heart is filled. 

If Marie has a sorrow, it is when she 
thinks of her poor father, who died far 
away from home and friends. She cor- 
responds occasionally with his people — 
not grand folk, as she in her childish 
days imagined ; but just worthy shop- 
keepers in Lyons. From them she 
has learned the story of his death : how 
he sent her mother, whose health was 
failing, to the bracing air of the north, 


82 


Two Paths. 


intending to join her shortly ; how busi- 
ness for his employers took him south, 
where he died alone, not knowing that 
his wife was already in the fair, far coun- 
try to which the just, first or last, all 
journey. And the good people never 
knew, until she wrote to them, that 
their son had left a child. 

So the young girl keeps up this pleas- 
ant correspondence with them, those far- 
away relatives whom she has never 
seen ; and by Mr. Atkinson’s invitation, 
two of them are soon to undertake a sea- 
voyage and pay a visit to America. 
They are assiduously studying English, 
the two cousins write, and would be 
glad if Marie would answer in that lan- 
guage ; in sentences, they add, “ not too 
difficult.” The following missive has 
gone in reply, and may serve to give 
pleasure to those who have followed 
this little story : 

“ My Dear Cousins : — How strange it 
seems every time I call you that ! How 
wonderful to think that I, who thought 
myself without kindred, have more cousins 
real cousins, than I can count on all 


Two Paths . 


83 


my fingers ! Greet them all for me, 
even the baby ; who has, I trust, got over- 
the illness which you say has made him 
so cross. Poor little fellow ! I won- 
der if we would be as amiable as he 
under the same circumstances? 

“ Perhaps the surest way to write just 
what you would wish to have me, is to 
look over your letter and answer your 
questions. How do I look? My dears, 
I do not know. I am too busy ever to 
think about it. I only know that Mad- 
ame Picard says I am careless of my com- 
plexion, liking the sun too well ; and 
that grandfather says I have my mother’s 
fair hair, and my father’s French eyes — 
eyes like those, I fancy, that will study 
over this English letter. If you had asked 
me of my grandfather — the most beauti- 
ful old gentleman — or of Madame Picard 
— the dearest old lady in all the Province, 
I do believe — I might have told you. 

“Your next question : What was the 
chief thing I learned in my visit to the 
great world ? in which you have honored 
me by being so interested. Just this — I 
learned that people who are good and 
poor are a hundred times better off than 


8 4 


Two Paths. 


the gay ones, who whirl around in the 
awful struggle for riches. 

“ My employer was a wealthy woman, 
and I do not believe that in all St. Gen- 
evieve there is one so miserable as she — 
though the people here have sad enough 
times, the good God knows, when the fish- 
ing is poor, or the crops fail. I hope you 
will not call this preaching. No, I leave 
that to others whose business it is ; but I 
shall never, I think, if I live to be a very 
old woman, forget that lesson. 

“Yes, as you say, my history has been 
a strange one, as far as it has gone ; but 
God’s hand has led me through it all. 
He has given me my grandfather, and, 
through him, my cousins over the sea ; 
• and He has taught me many things which 
I cannot trust myself to write about. 
When you come here in the spring, 
and we get better acquainted, I will tell 
you what I mean. 

“ I hope you will not find my letter 
‘too difficult,’ and that the baby is quite 
well again. Pray for me, dear cousins, far 
away, and believe me 

“Your loving 


‘‘ Marie.” 


Two Paths . 


35 


And so the “dear cousins far away” 
bend their bright eyes over the letter, 
with their dictionaries near at hand, 
slowly making out the kindly words. 

And Marie ? What can harm her ? A 
supreme test came, and she withstood it 
when she put on her peasant gown and 
chose between the two paths before her. 
So we leave her, in the care of the 
Blessed One whom no temptation could 
induce her to forsake — Our Lady of the 
Saguenay. 


A TALE THE BRETONS TELL 


i. 

Among the popular traditions that 
used to be, and for aught we know still 
are current at Clisson, in the Vendee, 
was that of the “ Turning Rock.” It 
was religiously believed by the peasantry 
that just at midnight, on Christmas Eve, 
an enormous rock in a warren bordering 
on the Sevres, turned of its own accord 
upside-down, thus signalizing the hour 
of the Saviour’s birth. 

About half a century ago, a French 
gentleman, named De Montmaur, seeing 
that his two sons, who had been reared 
in the vicinity of Clisson, believed in the 
Turning Rock, decided one Christmas 
Eve, to convince them that this tradition, 
like many others in vogue among the 


A Tale the Bretons Tell \ 87 

peasantry had no foundation in fact. 
“ Believe in miracles, my dear boys,” said 
he; ‘'but do not credit every idle tale 
you hear. To refuse to bend your reason 
before the great mystery that is commem- 
orated to-night would be both stupidity 
and pride ; to accept as true every old 
nurse’s tale would be silliness.” 

An hour before midnight M. de 
Montmaur and his sons, George and 
Louis, left the Providence Inn, where 
they had taken up their quarters, and 
proceeded to the warren. The night 
was calm and peaceful ; the azure dome 
sparkled with a million stars, as if illu- 
mined especially for the approaching so- 
lemnity ; and the moon shone in their 
midst like a queen surrounded by her 
courtiers. The vast ruins of an old cas- 
tle near by borrowed from the pearl- 
grey beams that clothed them as with a 
mantle, a melancholy aspect, that har- 
monized well with the thoughts of the 
inevitable decay awaiting the proudest 
works of man ; — thoughts that such bat- 
tered remnants of former stateliness al- 
ways suggest. 

“In the absence of Midnight Mass, 


88 


A Tale the Bretons Tell. 


my boys/’ said the father, “we can at 
least, with such a spectacle before our 
eyes, raise our hearts to God.” 

“Yes,” replied one of the youths; “in 
the solemn silence that surrounds us, 
there is something as soothing as the 
softest music. And when one listens it 
almost seems that he hears Nature 
breathing.” 

The three continued their walk in 
silence till they reached the ‘turning 
Rock. “ Look well now,” said M. de 
Montmaur. “ Midnight is at hand, and 
you will see that the rock does not 
turn.” Scarcely had he finished speak- 
ing when a distant bell rang out the hour. 

The two boys, their hearts throbbing 
with excitement, as is always the case 
when we expect something supernatural 
to occur, hardly breathed as they gazed 
fixedly at the rock, which, according to 
tradition, should have begun to turn, but 
which, nevertheless, remained motionless. 
They were still gazing when from the 
base of the rock there came a sound. It 
was not a noise such as would be made 
by the moving of one rock over another ; 
there was nothing awful in the sound — 


A Tale the Bretons Tell, 89 

it was the feeble and tremulous plaint of 
a little infant. Thoroughly surprised, 
M. de Montmaur hastily pushed aside 
the shrubbery that grew about the foot 
of the rock, and found, resting in a sort 
of niche, a wicker cradle, in which lay a 
baby perhaps three weeks or a month 
old. The child was well wrapped up in 
woolen blankets, and the cradle covered 
with a quilt ; but, notwithstanding these 
precautions, the cold had penetrated to 
the delicate little body, and the cry they 
had heard was its plaintive signal of 
distress. The father and his sons 
quickly carried the child, cradle and all, 
to their inn, and gave the little stranger 
into the care of the landlady. 

On taking the baby from its cradle, 
the good matron found hanging about its 
neck a blue ribbon, to which was at- 
tached a silver medal of the Blessed Vir- 
gin bearing the device, “ Consolatrix 
Afflictorumy She also discovered a 
sealed letter that had been attached to 
the wicker-work of the cradle. The 
seal represented a ship buffeted by the 
waves, and bore the inscription : “ To the 
care of God.” On the back of the en- 


90 A Tale the Bretons Tell. 

velope was written: “To whomsoever 
finds my child.” 

M. de Montmaur, remarking that he 
could open the letter as he was the first 
to perceive the child, did so ; and read, at 
first to himself, and then aloud : 

“ ‘ My child has been baptized. ... If 
I have abandoned it for a time, it is be- 
cause I was obliged to hasten to its 
father, who has just been condemned to 
death. Christians, take pity on the poor 
little girl, whom I bequeath to God, the 
Blessed Virgin, and you. The sad news 
of my husband’s imprisonment, and his 
condemnation forces me to leave her. . . . 
Alas ! perhaps I shall be too late. You 
who are charitable and compassionate, do 
not blame me, but care for my darling 
little Mary. ... I leave her at the Turn- 
ing Rock, knowing that curiosity will 
bring some of the credulous here before 
morning. May God, the Blessed Virgin, 
and the holy angels watch over her 
cradle ! ’ ” 

9 

When he had concluded the letter, 
which affected himself not less than his 


A Tale the Bretons Tell \ 91 

auditors, M. de Montmaur said : “ It is 
not on so holy a night as this that one 
can refuse aid to a helpless child. I 
therefore undertake to care for the little 
girl until her mother returns to claim her.” 

This engagement was faithfully kept. 
Mary Warren (so she was called by the 
family into which she was adopted) grew 
up in grace, beauty and piety, and be- 
came an accomplished girl. Mme. de 
Montmaur lavished on her education all 
the care that she would have bestowed 
on a daughter of her own, had God 
so blessed her. The family never 
learned anything of Mary’s mother. 
Inquiries were instituted, but proved 
unavailing ; it was ascertained only that 
a great many royalists, compromised in 
the political affairs of Bretagne, had 
been shot near Saint-Brieuc. Whether 
the little girl’s mother had *died shortly 
after her husband’s execution, or was still 
living, was unknown to all. 

It is rare that one has cause to repent 
of having .performed a good action ; and 
Mme. de Montmaur sometimes said to 
her husband : “ If Mary’s mother were to 
appear, what a void the dear girl’s de- 


92 A Tale the Bretons Tell. 

parture would leave in our family circle ! 
We have become so accustomed to look 
upon her as our daughter, and our boys 
to love her as tenderly as a sister, that a 
separation would be a real calamity. 
George and Louis, as you know, are of 
rather grave temperaments, and seldom 
ministered to the gaiety of our home ; 
Mary came as a lasting joy into our midst, 
and gave to us what was lacking.” 

A separation, however, between Mary 
and the young men was now at hand. 
It had ever been a part of their father’s 
plans for the education of his sons, that 
they should enjoy a season of travel. 
He had just secured an admirable tutor 
to accompany them ; and one day the 
youths with mingled regret at leaving a 
home circle so cherished, and joy over 
anticipated delights, set out for a tour 
through Southern France and Italy. 


A Tale the Bretons Tell ’ 


93 


II. 

After some months spent in visiting 
all the notable cities of Italy, with their 
inexhaustible treasures of art, our young- 
travellers, George and Louis, accom- 
panied Mr. Gervais, their tutor, on an 
expedition to which they had looked for- 
ward with more than ordinary pleasure. 
This was a visit to the snow-bound re- 
gions of the Alps, associated in their 
minds with the stirring deeds of Hanni- 
bal, Caesar, and Napoleon ; and also, with 
heroes of another and more beneficial, if 
less brilliant order — the pious monks of 
St. Bernard. 

Both young men were charmed with 
the hospitality that greeted them in the 
Great . Hospice, and listened with appre- 
ciative interest to the tales of lives saved 
from imminent peril through the sagac- 
ity and courage of the noble dogs and 
their devoted masters. One of the sinoru- 

o 

lar spectacles of the monastery was to 
be seen in an outer chapel, where nu- 
merous dead bodies, carefully arranged, 
awaited identification. These corpses 


94 A Tale the Bretons Tell. 

exhaled no offensive odor ; and, owing to 
the low temperature, were but little 
altered by their exposure. One corpse 
especially attracted the attention ol 
George de Montmaur. It was that of a 
ooor mother clasping to her icy breast 
aer infant child. Death itself had not 
separated the loved one from her em- 
brace. 

Speaking to the Father Abbe, that 
evening, of the impression made upon 
him by what he had seen and heard dur- 
ing the day, George mentioned the 
corpses of mother and child in the 
chapel. “ Ah ! yes,” said the Abbe, “ it 
is an affecting sight. But another 
mother, three years ago, moved our sym- 
pathy even more ; and she still lives. 
She came here in company with the 
Duchess of Devonshire. She was the 
widow of a Vendean ; her husband, with 
a number of other Breton gentlemen, 
had become compromised by political ac- 
tion ; and although she hastened to his 
prison, it was only to see him led out and 
shot. She was not allowed even to em- 
brace him ; and on witnessing his execu- 
tion she lost her reason. Her madness 


A Tale the Bretons Tell ’ 95 

was not at all dangerous to others, but it 
might easily have injured herself, as she 
sang, twenty times a day, political songs 
that were then proscribed. To save her 
from the prison that menaced her — for 
she, too, had been denounced as having 
carried on treasonable correspondence — 
an English lady took her out of France. 
Placed under the care of skillful physi- 
cians in London, her madness gradually 
wore away ; and the Duchess of Devon- 
shire, desiring a French companion, se- 
cured her services. 

“ During their sojourn at the Hospice, 
the noble duchess was extremely kind 
to us ; and I remember that she gave 
her companion a copy of the ‘ Genius of 
Christianity/ that she might read to us 
what Chateaubriand, says of our house. 
I can certify that the widow was then 
fully possessed of her reason, but on the 
following day she saw us carrying to the 
chapel the dead bodies of the mother 
and child in question. At the time she 
was kneeling before a statue of the 
Blessed Virgin. When she saw our bur- 
den she rose abruptly, and, with arms 
outstretched toward Our Lady, with ani- 


96 A Tale the Bretons Tell. 


mated countenance, and eyes fixed on the 
image, she cried out, in tones that echoed 
loudly through the chapel: ‘ Mother of 
Christ, thou hast not given me this hap- 
piness ! See, they are not separated ; 
but I — I have no longer my beloved 
child ! ’ ” 

“ You say she was the widow of a Ven- 
dean. Do you know from what part of 
La Vendee she came ?” inquired George, 
who had been manifesting extraordinary 
interest in the recital. 

“Yes ; she mentioned Clisson once or 
twice at first. ” 

“ Did she name her daughter ? ” asked 
George. 

“Yes, quite often after this outburst of 

• c ft 

griet. 

“ And how was her child called ? ” 

“ Mary.” 

“ Mary ! And do you know, Father, 
where this woman is at present ? ” 

“ Yes, my son. With the Brothers of 
St. John of God, at Lyons.” 

“ Then she relapsed into madness ? ” 

“ Alas ! yes ; she is completely insane.” 

“O Louis, Mr. Gervais, let us go at 
once!” cried George, excitedly. “We 


A Tale the Bretons Tell \ 9 7 

shall see the poor mother at Lyons. We 
will assure her that her daughter still 
lives ; that she shall behold her again, 
and will never more be separated from 
her. Her joy will restore her to rea- 
son. What thanks do we not owe you, 
Father ! You give to a mother her child, 
to a loving daughter her lost mother, and 
to all our family the purest joy.” 

Next morning George was first to 
arise ; and going down to the chapel, he 
heard the early Mass. After praying be- 
fore the image of Our Lady that had wit- 
nessed the relapse of Mary's mother, he 
told the sacristan that he had promised 
to hang a beautiful silver lamp before the 
Madonna’s statue, if the afflicted mother 
recovered her mind. “ Oh, how happy 
I shall be,” he added, “ if I can shortly 
send you my ex-voto / ” 

Taking leave of the hospitable monks 
the travellers started a few hours later 
for Lyons. On their arrival in that city, 
they at once proceeded to the asylum, 
where they learned from the superior of 
the Brothers that the woman whom they 
sought, although still insane, gave some 
hope of possible cure.* 


98 A Tale the Bretons Tell. 

“Is she fit now to travel ?” inquired 
George. 

“Yes, provided the journey be made 
by short stages, as she is still very 
weak.” 

“Then,” said Mr. Gervais, “we shall 
leisurely take her with us to Bretagne. 
Be kind enough, Father, to prepare the 
widow of the Vendean to accompany us, 
so that we may restore to her arms the 
daughter whom she thinks lost, and 
whom she has so bitterly lamented.” 

“ The joy which you are about to give 
her may prove as disastrous as the great- 
est misfortune,” said the superior; “es- 
pecially, if bestowed suddenly. Alas ! 
not to cause her to die for very joy, 
when she has suffered so terribly, you 
must take many precautions. The heart 
so long unused to comfort, may break, if 
flooded all at once with so great a happi- 
ness.” 

“ Have no fears, Father; we will lead 
your patient gradually to the possession 
of the joy that awaits her.” 

Three days later the three friends of 
Mary, with her poor mother, began their 
journey to Bretagne. George would 


A Tale the Bretons Tell. 99 

often introduce into the conversation 
names that must have been familiar to 
her in other days ; but she evinced not 
the slighest interest in them, and they 
evidently recalled no impression to her 
disordered brain. This was a sad disap- 
pointment to her travelling companions, 
as both Mr. Gervais and the young men 
had counted much on her manifesting an 
awakening of interest in allusions to 
former well-known scenes. 

One evening, however, while the 
horses were being changed, Louis hap- 
pened to remark to his brother : “ Look 

over there in that field ; that big rock 

reminds me of the Turning Rock at Clis- 
>> 

son. 

At these words, the widow, who was 
crouching in the rear of the carriage, 
and whom they had thought asleep, sud- 
denly bent forward, and looked out in 
the direction indicated. She gazed for a 
moment on the rock that lay bathed in 
the moonlight, then turned away, and 
raised her glance to heaven. George, 
who sat facing her, noticed tears falling 
from her large black eyes and dropping 
like pearls on her sombre dress. He saw, 


ioo A Tale the Bretons TelL 

too, the thin white hands convulsively 
contracted, and felt that the dagger of 
sorrow was piercing the broken heart 
anew. 

“ She suffers, and is praying,” thought 
he ; and forthwith he began to hum an 
old Breton Christmas carol. The air, 
which she must have heard time and 
again, would perhaps recall to her mind 
that fatal Christmas night of bygone 
years. For some minutes she listened; 
and when George stopped, she said to 
him : 

“Mr. George, continue to sing that 
air ; it does me good.” 

“You remember it, then ?” 

“ I think I must have heard it, but it 
was a long, long time ago,” she replied. 
“ It is a song of our country.” 

“Of your country?” 

“Yes, and of yours, too.” 

“ Alas ! where is my country? I know 
it no longer. I am only a poor withered 
leaf that the wind whirls about at will. 
But I don’t know the tree from which I 
have fallen, to lie in the dust, be tram- 
pled underfoot, then carried away again 
by the tempest.” 


A Tale the Bretons Tell ioi 


“ There are fine trees in the warren at 
Clisson.” 

“ Clisson ! I have heard tell of Clisson. 
It is not in England, it is not in Scot- 
land, not in Italy — for, you know, I 
have travelled all through there with 
the duchess. Where is Clisson, then ? 
Tell me, Mr. George.” 

“In Bretagne, near Nantes.” 
“Bretagne, Nantes! Nantes, Bre- 
tagne ! All that gets lost and mixed up 
in my poor head. Oh, how I would 
bless the hand that could tear away the 
veil that falls and shuts me out from my 
memory ! — Look here ! See now, if you 
can, the beautiful firmament all sprin- 
kled with golden stars.” As she spoke 
she placed her hand over the young 
man’s eyes. “You see nothing, eh? — 
because my hand is between your eyes 
and the sky. Well, there is always 
something between my memory and the 
places of which you speak. Clisson ! 
Since you have said that word it is here 
on my heart like a leaden ball. At 
Clisson there is an old castle in ruins, is 
there not ?” 

“Yes.” 


102 A Tale the Bretons Tell \ 


“ The river flows down below the old 
castle?” 

“Yes,” repeated George; “and on the 
opposite bank there are ” 

“ Many trees and fine walks.” 

“Yes; and near the oaks — do you re- 
member ? ” 

“ I remember nothing,” she said, 
faintly. 

“You mistake; you have just remem- 
bered the castle, the river, the trees, and 
promenades. If you like you can re- 
member ” 

“What?” 

“The Turning Rock.” 

o 

“ Ah, you are cruel as an executioner ! 
I did not want that place to come back 
to my thoughts, and you have come to 
dig it out of a fold in my brain, to hold 
it, all blood-stained, before my memory, 
and bind me to it, to suffer torture. Go 
out of my sight ! I wish never to see 
you again ! ” 

A nervous attack followed this out- 
burst; and it was fortunate that the trav- 
ellers were near Auxerre, in which city 
they were to remain for the night. Mr. 
Gervais and Louis helped the widow out 


A Tale the Bretons Tell. 103 


of the carriage ; she refused the aid of 
him who had forced on her the recollec- 
tion of the Turning Rock in the warren. 


III. 

The patient spent a disturbed and 
restless night. She was still so agitated 
on the following morning that the jour- 
ney could not be resumed, as had been 
arranged ; and Mr. Gervais profited by 
the delay to visit an old friend, the Abbe 
Cervon, canon of the Auxerre Cathedral. 
This estimable priest had so identified 
himself with the Cathedral that he might 
well be considered an integral part of it. 
As a boy he had been a server in its 
sanctuary ; a young man, he had cele- 
brated his first Mass at its grand altar ; 
and now, in the decline of his days, he 
had returned, after an absence of twenty 
years, to finish his sacred ministry where 
he had begun it, within the shadow of its 
venerable towers. God, and God’s poor, 
his beloved Cathedral, and his books filled 
up his time, except when his bishop, with 


104 A? Tale the Bretons Tell ’ 

whom he was a favorite, took him as a 
companion in his visitations throughout 
the diocese. One result of these occa- 
sional visits was the intimate acquaint- 
ance of the Abbe Cervon with all his 
brother pastors. 

Mr. Gervais, in the course of his conver- 
sation with the venerable priest, explained 
his presence in Auxerre by narrating a 
portion of the story which we have al- 
ready told. When he mentioned that 
the unfortunate mother was then in Aux- 
erre, unable for the time being to proceed 
farther, the abbe interrupted him with : 
“ My dear friend, it was God who di- 
rected you hither : it was He who pre- 
vented your departing this morning 
before having seen me. All this is prov- 
idential. Your unhappy travelling com- 
panion will be cured by one of our parish 
priests, who for the past five years has 
worked marvellous cures in mental dis- 
eases of this nature — cures which have 
obtained for him on the one hand innum- 
erable blessings ; on the other, jealousy, 
and hatred. His method of treatment 
has in it something that much delights 

o o 

me. He calls to his aid, to effect a res- 


A Tale the Bretons Tell 105 

toration, something besides drugs and po- 
tions : religion, poetry, music, the tender 
affections of the soul — these are his aux- 
iliaries. He will delight you, my dear 
Gervais, as he has enchanted me. Let 
us leave here to-night. We will sleep in 
his village, endeavoring to arrive there 
without his knowledge of my being in his 
parish ; otherwise no inn could retain us : 
he would surely carry us off to his house, 
or rather his hospital. He is a patri- 
arch who exercises hospitality as it was 
exercised in the old days ; and I verily 
believe that, as a recompense for his 
charity, God permits His angels to con- 
verse with him as they were wont to do 
with Abraham and Jacob. It must have 
been one of those celestial visitants who 
taught him his art of curing the insane.” 
The abbe spoke with such genuine en- 
thusiasm, and such evident faith in the 
utility of the proposed visit, that he in- 
spired Mr. Gervais with a kindred belief. 
The tutor at once returned to the inn, 
and consulted with the brothers as to 
their next procedure. It was decided to 
follow the good abbe’s advice, and 
toward three in the afternoon, the party 


106 A Tale the Bretons Tell 

set out for the medical pastors village. 
The widow entered the carriage mechan- 
ically, and gave no other sign of intelli- 
gence than to motion Louis to the seat 
opposite her, which hitherto had been oc- 
cupied by George. 

The village was reached at sunset. 
The party put up at the first inn they 
came to — the “ Green Cross”; and, after 
installing Mary’s mother in a private 
room, in charge of an attendant, the 
Abbe Cervon conducted the tutor and 
his pupils to the residence of the pastor. 
The presbytery was a modest dwelling, 
with a spacious garden in front ; climbing 
plants grew up around the windows, the 
fragrant blossoms filling the apartments 
with a pleasant odor that blended well 
with the air of peaceful happiness which 
pervaded all the surroundings of the doc- 
tor-priest. 

“ My dear Curl” said the canon of 
Auxerre on entering, “ I have brought 
you some friends and a patient.” 

“ Welcome all! If you had with you 
only friends, my joy at seeing you again, 
M. l’Abbe, would be complete. But a 
patient is a sad travelling companion. 


A Tale the Bretojis Tell. 107 

Suffering has need of so much re- 
pose.” 

“ You will cure her for us, my excellent 
doctor,” said the canon. 

“ My dear friend, we will ask God, who 
cures and resuscitates, to restore her to 
health. It is He, whose unworthy minis- 
ter I am, that cures, not I.” 

Mr. Gervais and the canon then ex- 
plained to the curl the condition of the 
afflicted woman, and the interest they took 
in her restoration. After some further 
conversation, it was decided that on the 
morrow Mary’s mother should be removed 
from the Green Cross Inn, and brought to 
the hospital that adjoined the presbytery. 

“ Alas ! ” said the curl, “ I have here a 
number afflicted in the same way. In- 
sanity is the disease of an age like ours. 
When nations are seized with the de- 
lirium of pride, so many distresses rend 
hearts, so many inquietudes agitate and 
torment minds, that it is not rare to see 
strong heads letting escape the reason 
with which God abundantly provided 
them.” 

The conversation had been prolonged 
for an hour or more, when it was inter- 


108 A Tale the Bretons Tell. 

rupted by the sound of a little bell. 
“Ah!” said the abbe, “that calls your 
patients to evening prayer, do not allow 
us to detain you.” 

“Yes, but this exercise is for the ordi- 
nary patients ; I have a special evening 
prayer later on for those who are most 
seriously afflicted. Among them are 
some who are not satisfied with praying 
through the priest ; they desire to speak 
to God themselves and aloud. And I 
assure you, my friends, there frequently 
come from their hearts sublime invoca- 
tions ; these beings, who have no sane 
ideas as to the things of this world, occa- 
sionally have very just ones concerning 
the other. From these broken lyres there 
still escape beautiful strains of melody.” 

George and Louis inquired whether it 
would not be possible to be present dur- 
ing the prayers, and were told that they 
could attend by taking their seats in a 
curtained alcove of the chapel, where 
they would be unseen by the unfortunate 
lunatics. The cur 6 went to preside at 
the prayers of his more amenable pa- 
tients ; and, returning a half hour later, 
conducted his four guests to the alcove 


A Tale the Bretons Tell 109 

mentioned. Shortly afterward steps were 
heard, the chapel door opened, and eight 
women, led by a Sister robed in blue 
and black, entered, and, proceeding to the 
left row of pews, knelt down quietly. A 
few minutes later five men, conducted by 
a Brother of St. John of God, came in 
and took their places in the pews on the 
right. Then a grave, sweet prelude was 
played on the organ, and the poor creat- 
ures, whose glances on entering were 
wandering and distracted, at once became 
recollected. One of the men exclaimed 
aloud as he caught the first sound of the 
music : “ Silence ! God is speaking/ 

Little by little the harmony died away, 
melting gradually into silence ; and the 
voice of the pastor began the evening 
prayer. Just as he concluded the organ 
was heard again, and surely sounds more 
expressive, more soul-moving, never broke 
on the silence of an oratory. The mu- 
sician was a young Brother, and beneath 
his skilful touch there welled forth verita- 
ble human sighs and moans, followed by 
outbursts of confiding hope and sweet 
canticles of love. 

This artist of Nature's own training 


I IO 


A Tale the Bretons TelL 


had himself been a lunatic ; for a number 
of years he had been confined in the asy- 
lum at Lyons, and he had regained his 
reason only after untiring care and pa- 
tience had been lavished on him by the 
members of the community. Thoroughly 
sane at present, there remained in him 
nothing of the lunacy except the memory 
of what had penetrated to his soul when 
the hand of God weighed heavily upon 
him ; and he now gave to others what had 
administered to his own consolation in 
those sad days of endless blank. His 
memory served him well ; for the lunatics 
seemed to understand his music as they 
would a language which they had learned. 

The exercises over, the men left the 
chapel, and the echo of their footsteps 
soon died away. Seven of the women 
then arose and followed the Sister to the 
door. The eighth remained kneeling be- 
fore a statue of the Blessed Virgin, and 
appeared to have no intention of de- 
parting. 

The Sister approached her and said 
gently: “ Madame Margaret, your com- 
panions are waiting for you. Prayer is 
finished.” 


A Tale the Bretons Tell 


1 1 1 


"Tut, tut, Sister! Take them to the 
dormitory and leave me here. The 
Comforter of the Afflicted spoke to me 
while Brother Hyacinth was playing the 
organ. I must stay here and pray. To- 
night the Virgin is going to restore to 
my arms my poor child.” 

"Well, remain quiet then, kneeling as 
you are now,” said the religious. "I will 
come back in a little while and remain 
with you.” 

" Oh, I am not afraid here ! I like to 
watch that lamp burning there before the 
altar. The flame is in that silver vase, 
living, active, just like the memory of 
my child in my heart. And, then, those 
angels that are adoring there — they 
would stop any one who wished to hurt 
me. And all these saints ” 

She was still talking when, some time 
after the Sister retired, the spectators in 
the alcove arose and noiselessly with- 
drew. 

" When Mary’s mother comes here,” 
remarked George, as they reached the 
open air, "she will find a twin sister in 
misfortune.” 

On the following day the widow was 


I 12 


A Tale the Bretons Tell ’ 


brought to the hospital and given in 
charge to the citrt. After a lonorexami- 
nation, during which he contrived to 
rouse her from the taciturnity in which 
she had indulged since her relapse at 
Mount St. Bernard, he said to Mr. Ger- 
vais and his friends : “ The flame may 
grow brilliant, but the lamp is almost 
worn out ; the least shock may break it.” 

“ Remember,” said George, “ that we 
have her daughter to restore to her. It 
was the blast of misfortune that extin- 
guished the flame ; the breath of joy will 
recreate the spark.” 

“ Yes, the poor mother,” observed the 
medical pastor, “ must receive that hap- 
piness only drop by drop. It must reach 
her as the oculist allows the light to reach 
the eyes of one on whom he has per- 
formed an operation for the cataract. I 
fear so much,” he added, “all emotional 
excitement, that I would prefer that the 
daughter should be brought to her 
here.” 

“ Then my father shall bring her,” an- 
swered George De Montmaur. 

“In that case, I shall have much 
greater hope of effecting a cure.” 


A Tale the Bretons Tell ’ 113 

“It will be just as you desire,” said 
Mr. Gervais. 

In a few moments it was decided that 
Mr. Gervais and Louis should leave at 
once for Bretagne, while George and the 
Abbe Cervon remained and partook of 
the hospitality of the venerable cure. 

During the interval that elapsed before 
the arrival of the father and adopted 
sister, George had more leisure than he 
found opportunity to employ. Most of 
it he passed in observing, studying and 
admiring the genius of Charity as exem- 
plified in the hospital. From dawn till 
the shadows fell a gentle supervision fol- 
lowed every movement of the nine female 
and five male lunatics who had been con- 
fided to “the good shepherd.” In their 
walks, in their working-rooms, in their 
dormitories, the unfortunate beines were 
always under the eye of a religious. 
One thing they all especially loved was 
music ; and Brother Hyacinth, who had 
played the organ in the chapel, spent the 
greater part of his time seated at a piano 
that had been placed in his little cham- 
ber. Before seating himself to play he 
would open his window and door ; and as 


1 14 A Tale the Bretons Tell. 

soon as the patients heard the first notes 
they would come at once to his room. 
Seating themselves on benches, with their 
elbows resting on their knees, and sup- 
porting their chins in their hands, they 
would listen enraptured to the touching 
harmonies which the young religious 
evoked from his own soul to comfort 
theirs. 

One morning George heard one of the 

o o 

men remark to a comrade : “ He does me 
as much good as if he gave me a drink. 
His playing is like a glass of water when 
one has a fever.” Another time, as he 
was sitting in a summer-house in the 
garden, George heard the voices of 
women. Looking through the trellis- 
work, he saw that they were two of the 
female patients, followed at some dis- 
tance by a religious. One of the women 
was weeping bitterly, and the other, in 
whom he at once recognized Mary’s 
mother, was endeavoring to console her. 

“ You at least,” said the widow, “know 
where your child is. When the Blessed 
Virgin’s little angels came to take him 
from his crib, they told you they were 
taking him to heaven. You know that 

o 


A Tale the Bretons Tell \ 


1 1 5 

he is there. And when your son de- 
parted with the cherubim, he had known 
only the milk of your bosom, the pressure 
of your caresses, the kisses of your lips. 
Poor little dear! he knew only the honey 
of life. But my child, my sweet little 
Mary — what has become of her? Per- 
haps she has grown up only to suffer ; 
perhaps nobody went that Christmas 
night to the Turning Rock at Clisson ; 
perhaps she died of hunger, and her 
mothers bosom was not there to relieve 
the little angeL ,, 

At these words the comforter burst 
into tears ; and George heard nothing 
further except mutual sobs mingling to- 
gether, like the mournful strains of two 
seolian harps placed side by side. 

This incident served only to heighten 
young De Montmaurs impatience for the 
arrival of his father and Mary, and the 
days seemed to him almost interminable. 
How long the hours were in passing! 
Would that expected party from Bretagne 
never arrive ? 


1 1 6 A Tale the Brctoris Tell. 


IV. 

George’s anxious hopes were at last 
realized, when, one Sunday morning, 
there rolled up to the Green Cross Inn a 
post-carriage containing M. De Mont- 
maur, Mary, . Louis, and Mr. Gervais. 
Having warmly greeted his father, 
George turned to his adopted sister, and 
anticipated her wishes by telling her at 
once of her mother’s condition. Again 
and again he repeated such consolatory 
phrases as : " The good curt has great 
hopes. — She is quite calm. — We have 
only one thing to fear: the excess of her 
joy on learning of your existence.” 

"And this joy,” answered Mary," she 
and I owe especially to you, George. 
Mr. Gervais and Louis have told me the 
whole story. How can I ever thank 
you enough?” And she gave her hand 
to the young man, who as he gazed 
upon her beautiful countenance, wreathed 
with grateful smiles, suddenly became 
cognizant of a sentiment of relief that 
Mary was his adopted sister only, not a 
real relative. 


A Tale the Bretons Tell. 1 1 7 

“ My child,” said M. De Montmaur 
to Mary, “you will remain here with 
your maid. We, after we get rid of the 
dust of travel, will proceed to the pres- 
bytery, and pay our respects to the good 
priest from whom we expect so much 
happiness.” 

“ O father,” cried Mary, “ let me ac- 
company you ! I may perhaps see her.” 

“And you will not be calm enough to 
restrain yourself at the sight.” 

“ I will answer for myself. George, 
you will answer for me, too ; will you 
not ? ” 

“ No not this time. I really cannot. 
It makes one so sad to look upon her! 
You can see, despite her beauty, that she 
has suffered cruelly.” 

“Then she is beautiful!” said the girl, 
with a daughters pride. 

“You resemble her, Mary,” rejoined 
George. “Take my advice, sister, and 
postpone your visit to the hospital until 
this evening. You can then be present 
at the night prayer, the devotion which 
your mother loves best. She has con- 
tracted a strong friendship with another 
mother who has also lost her child. 


1 1 8 A Tale the Bretons Tell. 

Both have a tender devotion for the Vir- 
gin who found her Divine Son in the 
Temple ; and sometimes the Sister who 
has charge of them allows them to re- 
main in the chapel after the other pa- 
tients have retired. Perhaps this even- 
ing they may be accorded this privilege, 
and from a screened alcove you will see 
and hear everything. It is then and 
there, as you will see, that all the tender- 
ness of your mother’s heart is best re- 
vealed.” 

“ My poor mother ! Very well ; I re- 
sign myself and will wait until evening.” 

M. De Montmaur, with his two sons 
and their tutor, proceeded to the church ; 
and, on the conclusion of High Mass, 
paid their visit to the curd. He con- 
firmed the news which George had im- 
parted as to the calmness of the widow, 
and agreed to the proposal that Mary 
should be brought that evening to see 
the mother whom she so impatiently 
longed to behold. In granting his per- 
mission, however, he insisted on the 
necessity of great prudence, as he would 
not risk exciting his patient by any sud- 
den disclosures. 


A Tale the Bretons Tell ’ 119 

% 

Mary thought that Sunday a very, 
very long one ; but evening came at 
length. I will not attempt to describe 
the emotion of this maiden of sixteen, 
who was for the first time in her life to 
recognize her mother. As lono- as she 
could remember that mother had been 
dead ; this knowledge that she was still liv- 
ing came upon her like the rolling away 
of a stone from a sepulchre — it was a ver- 
itable resurrection. The young girl felt 
that she would love with her whole heart 
this mother whom God had restored to 
her ; but this separation, this high and 
thick wall which insanity had built be- 
tween mother and child — would it be so 
completely overthrown that the daughter 
would find all her mother, her mother 
with unclouded mind, and heart free 
from crushing sorrow ? Mary wished 
only to hope for the best ; but as the 
hour of trial drew near, doubt and fear 
insinuated themselves into the poor 
child’s soul. George, too, who for the 
past fortnight had been radiant with 
hope, felt less confident than ever be- 
fore. 

The nine o’clock bell had rung, and 

o 


120 A Tale the Bretons Tell. 

already M. De Montmaur, Mary, George, 
Louis, Mr.Gervais, and the kindly Abbe 
Cervon, had installed, themselves in the 
curtained alcove. The altar in the little 
chapel was decorated with more than 
usual richness ; the flame of the sanct- 
uary lamp seemed brighter, and the fra- 
grance of burning incense mingled with 
the odor of freshly culled flowers. It 
was truly a spot whose peaceful, sooth- 
ing influence might well react on dis- 
ordered minds and troubled hearts. 

Mary, on her knees, waited with inex- 
pressible anxiety, her face pressed close 
to an aperture in the curtains. She 
watched eagerly, but every few moments 
was obliged to wipe away the tears that 
clouded her vision. She did not fancy 
that her excitement could possibly be- 
come greater ; but as the door of the 
chapel opened, and the lunatics entering, 
passed near the alcove in going to their 
seats, her heart beat so violently that she 
imagined it must break. 

“Sit down,” whispered M. De Mont- 
maur. “ You are going to be ill. Come 
with me outside for a few moments.” 

“ Presently,” she answered. “ I wish to 


A Tale the Bretons Tell. 121 


recoenize her. There she is ! That is 

o 

she; is it not, George?” 

“ Yes.” 

“ That one who has braided flowers in 
her hair, and whose face is so sweet, so 
gracious, yet so sorrowful ? ” 

“ Yes, ” 

"‘Ah, my God! my God!” she cried; 
“ I am dying, but it is of joy.” 

Uttering these words in a low voice, 
Mary swooned and fell back into the 
arms of M. De Montmaur. She had 
scarcely been carried outside when she 
regained consciousness, and insisted on 
returning to the alcove. In vain they 
dissuaded her ; she was soon on her 
knees a^ain behind the curtain. 

The organ was now sighing out ac- 
cords inexpressibly touching and sweet. 
And those who listened pronounced no 
words : they felt that their thoughts and 
vows were being carried up to the throne 
of mercy by these strains of heavenly 
harmony. 

Mary’s eyes turned often from the al- 
tar to rest on her afflicted parent ; and 
the widow, by some incomprehensible 
instinct, kept her gaze riveted on the 


122 


A Tale the Bretons Tell. 


alcove. As the girl’s eyes encountered 
her mother’s an indescribable thrill ran 
through her being ; and perhaps the poor 
crazy woman experienced a like sensa- 
tion. 

In the chanting of the Litany of Lo- 
retto, when the priest sang, “ Comforter 
of the Afflicted,” one voice dominated 
every other in responding, “ Pray for 
us ! ” And, recognizing it as that of the 
widow, the cure repeated the invocation 
three times. As if thoroughly conscious 
of his design in thrice addressing their 
special Patroness, the insane threw all 
the fervor of their souls into the an- 
swers ; and assuredly their “ Pray for 
us!” could not but touch the compas- 
sionate Heart of the Mother and Queen 
whose aid they besought. 

When the notes of the organ finally 
died away, at the termination of the 
Litany, the prayer was said, the curd 
blessed his patients, and all retired. 
Much to the disappointment of the party 
in the alcove, none of the patients 
sought to remain after the others. Per- 
haps it was as well, however, for Mary’s 
excitement was already very great ; and 


A Tale the Bretons Tell 123 

had she heard her poor mother pleading 
with all the eloquence of woe to the 
Blessed Virgin for comfort in her dis- 
tress, the scene might have proved too 
much for her agitated nerves. After 
some conversation with the amiable cure , 
who revived her sinking hopes as to the 
ultimate restoration of her mother’s 
reason, the young girl returned to the 
inn, where it had been decided she was 
to remain for some days. The curd 
gave his permission for her to visit the 
hospital, but declared that she could not 
be seen by her mother until a propitious 
occasion should present itself. 

Mary possessed considerable skill as a 
musician ; and her voice, without being 
at all remarkable for its volume, was 
singularly sweet and expressive. The 
Abbe Cervon and the curd took her into 
Brother Hyacinth’s cell on the occasion 
of one of her visits ; and, after requesting 
the young religious to play a prelude 
and to improvise for a few moments 
until the patients gathered in the garden 
beneath his open window (it being now 
the middle of May, they no longer en- 
. tered his room), the cure said to Mary; 


124 ^ Tale the Bretons Tell \ 

“Now, do you take the Brother’s place 
and sing one of the songs of your native 
province. Remember, ” he added, “ that 
she who is nearest to the window and 
will hear you best is your poor mother.” 

“ Oh, that thought will make my voice 
tremble, will stifle it with sobs ! ” 

“So much the better,” answered the 
curl. “ What I desire is to make your 
mother weep ; your tears may unseal the 
fountain where hers have been so long 
locked up.” 

Mary obeyed ; her light fingers swept 
the ivory keyboard and elicited sounds 
that vibrated with deepest melancholy. 
Playing no special air, she blended rem- 
iniscences of old Breton refrains with 
the improvisation of the moment. As 
these passages from well-known melodies 
reached the widow’s ear, the curd who, 
unseen, was watching her, saw the poor 
woman put her hand to her forehead, 
like one who tries to recall some con- 
fused memory. Suddenly Mary’s trem- 
ulous voice blended with the notes of the 
piano. At this there was a lively move- 
ment of surprise through all the auditors. 
This was not the full, rich voice of . 


A Tale the Bretons Tell 125 

Brother Hyacinth : it was something 

softer, sweeter. One of the listeners ex- 
claimed : “ It is no longer a man, ’tis an 
angel that sings ! ” 

The pastor was well pleased with the 
result of this first trial, and, as the days 
went on, had Mary frequently repeat her 
simple concerts. Several times some 
old familiar chord seemed to revive the 
memory of the widow, and a gleam of re- 
turning intelligence flashed from her eye 
as she ga zed on the window through 

o o 

which came the flood of harmony. Once 
Mary, at the suggestion of George, 
played and sang the Breton Christmas 
carol which her mother had requested 
George to continue when he had hummed 
the air some weeks before. Again the 
air was recognized, but apparently it 
now brought back bitter memories ; for 
the afflicted woman, after listening to 
one stanza, hurried from the window, 
and, seating herself on a rustic bench in 
a distant part of the garden, indulged in 
a passionate outburst of grief. 

In his conversations with the Abbe 
Cervon and M. De Montmaur, the 
doctor-priest expatiated frequently on 


126 A Tale the Bretons Tell. 


the beneficial influence on the insane of 
religion, music, and poetry. He had 
proved the truth of his theory in several 
instances ; and affirmed that where the 
patient, while sane, had possessed an ar- 
dent imagination or a poetic temper- 
ament, the chances of recovery through 
such influences were most favorable. 
From what he had observed personally, 
and from the account of the widow given 
by the Sister in charge of the female 
patients, he judged that Mary's mother 
had possessed such a temperament, 
and therefore, felt confident of her 
cure. 

However, to endanger nothing by any 
precioation, he explained that he would 
defer the great test until the end of the 
beautiful month they were then celebrat- 
ing. In France especially, perhaps, is 
May surrounded with all the exquisite 
poetry of religious devotion. During 
the whole month Our Lady’s altars are 
decked with innumerable flowers and 
lights. Before a thousand shrines, where 
the treasures of art vie with those of na- 
ture in beautifying the resting-place of 
the Virgin’s statue, young and old, the 


A Tale the Bretons Tell. 127 

happy and those whose tears bedew the 
bread they earn, assemble to pray and 
sing together ; every morning Mass is 
celebrated with unusually rich vestments, 
and every evening the altar is ablaze with 
lights for Benediction. 

To these prayers and canticles are 
joined instructions, teaching confidence 
in the Mother of Mercy ; the pastors re- 
count miracles that have been wrought 
by her — wonders that are nowhere, per- 
haps, so common as in France. And 
when, as the words “ Jesus ” and “ Mary ” 
are spoken by the preacher, all the white- 
veiled heads of women and young 
maidens bend and are raised again, one 
fancies that he is looking on a garden 
all planted with lilies, whose blossoms 
are swayed by the breath of spring, or 
bend beneath an angel’s footsteps. 

This poetry of Our Lady’s cult speaks 
to the heart and elevates the soul ; the 
doctor-priest knew it, and wished that 
the poor widow should be prepared for 
her return to reason by Our Lady her- 
self. It was through the flower-strewn 
and perfume-laden weeks of Mary’s 
month that he designed to lead the des- 


128 A Tale the Bretons Tell ’ 

olate mother to the child whose loss had 
been so long deplored. 


V. 

The sunny days of the Virgin’s Month 
sped rapidly by, and finally dawned the 
31st, whose coming was fraught with so 
much of hope to those with whom our 
modest tale has to do. The doctor- 
priest, up with the sun, had prepared 
everything in the oratory of the insane 
for the Mass which he was to celebrate 
at eight o’clock. Freshly culled flowers, 
with the dew still sparkling in their 
golden calyxes, decked the altar in har- 
monious colors, and filled the whole 
apartment with a delightful aroma. 
Hundreds of waxen tapers burned 
brightly in the massive yet graceful silver 
candelabra, which were the special pride 
of the good cure s heart ; the richest of 
his tabernacle veils had been hung before 
the earthly home of the Eucharist ; and 
all was beauty, light, color, and fragrance. 

Mary’s mother, alone of the cures 


A Tale the Bretons Tell 129 

patients, was to be present at the Mass. 
For the first time her daughter was to 
kneel by her side, facing the altar of that 
God who holds intellects as well as hearts 
in His omnipotent hands. M. De 
Montmaur, his sons, Mr. Gervais and the 
Abbe Cervon, with the Sister who had 
charge of the afflicted widow, were the 
only others to be present ; and the Queen 
of the May was to be besieged with 
prayers as ardent as ever won her com- 
passionating smile on human sorrows 
and her children’s woe. 

Brother Hyacinth was already at the 
organ. The cure had told him every- 
thing : had narrated the story of the 
Christmas night ; the cradle and baby 
hidden at the Turning Rock of Clisson ; 
the departure of the poor mother to wit- 
ness her husband’s death ; her travels in 
England and Italy ; the sad incident of 
Mt. St Bernard ; and then the fate of the 
child adopted by a noble family, and 
finding in them father, mother, and 
brothers. 

“ There, ” said the skilful priest, “ now, 
Brother, you know the past of this poor 
woman whom we desire to cure. It js a 


130 A Tale the Bretons Tell. 

question of bringing back to her mind 
memories partially or completely effaced 
by time and misfortune. With God’s 
grace to assist us, my words and your 
harmonies must dispel the clouds that 
envelop the past and darken the present 
of this poor mother. Brother Hyacinth, 
you too have suffered, and you remember 
the accords which were most effective in 
stirring your soul in those days when the 
light of your reason was eclipsed. Well, 
this morning let your organ breathe out 
those same accords. I commit this im- 
portant part of my treatment to your 
talent and your charity.” 

M. De Montmaur’s party entered the 
chapel first. Mary was robed in pure 
white ; her luxuriant golden hair was 
parted on her brow in the style of 
Raphael’s angels, and fell in unconfined, 
wavy ringlets over her neck and shoul- 
ders. About her throat was a blue ribbon, 
from which hunof the little silver medal 
found with her in the cradle sixteen years 
before. Its inscription, engraved beneath 
the figure of Our Lady, was peculiarly 
appropriate for the occasion ; it was 
“ Consolatrix Afflictorum 


A Tale the Bretons Tell 13 1 

At a sign from the curl, Mary arose 
as her mother and the Sister entered the 
oratory, and going to the holy-water font, 
dipped in her fingers and offered the holy 
water to her unsuspecting parent. The 
latter, struck with the beauty and dignity 
of the being who thus appeared to her, 
hesitated a moment before touching her 
fingers ; then, turning to the Sister, 
said : “ It is an angel ; so it must be that 

God has pity on me.” 

“Yes,” remarked the curl ; “yes, my 
child : the God who healed the sick, who 
made the paralytics walk, the blind see, 
and the deaf hear, is about to end like- 
wise all your woes.” 

“ My woes are not in me : they are in 

the absence of ” 

“ Wherever they are, God knows well, 
and He is going to bring them to an end.” 
Here the widow shook her head as if 
in doubt, and the priest continued : “ My 

daughter, do you doubt the divine good- 
ness or power ? ” 

“ No : I believe — but ” 

“Well? — but what?” 

“ I have faith, but I no longer have 
any hope.” 


132 A Tale the Bretons Tell ' 

“ Not to hope in the Lord is to sin.” 

“ Oh, don’t think that I don’t wish to 
have hope ! I hunger and thirst for it, 
but it comes to me no more. Look! I 
am dried and withered like grass on 
which the dew no longer falls.” 

As she spoke the poor widow held out 
her arms, thin and skeleton-like. Mary 
was at her side, and could not help seiz- 
ing one of the emaciated hands in her own. 

‘'Oh, what a gentle touch! Ah, it is 
the angel ! ” 

o 

“No, no ; I am not an angel.” 

“ Who are you, then — you who are so 
beautiful and seem so good?” 

“ I am a daughter who is looking for 
her mother — for a mother who has suf- 
fered as much as you.” 

“ As much as I ? Oh, no ! ” And 
again she shook her head, as if denying 
the possible truth of such a statement. 

“Margaret,” said the curd, “it is not 
well to believe that others as well as 
yourself have not had their share of mis- 
fortune. Such a thought may banish 
charity from your heart. When we pity 
ourselves too much, we do not suffi- 
ciently commiserate others.” 


A Tale the Bretons Tell. 


133 


“Oh, if her mother has endured suf- 
fering such as mine, I pity her from my 
very soul ! ” 

“ I do not remember/’ said Mary, 
ever being embraced by my mother.” 

“ She died, then, while you were still 
a baby ?” 

“ No : she is living yet.” 

“Then you were stolen from her? 
Yes, there are those who steal children.” 
“No, I was not stolen from her 
either.” 

“ But the tenderness of a mother for 
her child surpasses everything else.” 

‘‘ Great calamities, imperious circum- 
stances sometimes necessitate cruel sepa- 
rations,” said the cure. “ Margaret, do 
you not believe that a woman, to save 
her husband, may abandon her child for 
a time ?” 

“What do you say of saving hus- 
bands? I did not save mine. No, no, I 
saved no one : they were all three shot 
in the square.” 

“Margaret, recall your thoughts from 
that blood-stained spot.” 

“ Oh, yes : bloody, bloody ! ” 

“ Think of something else.” 


134 A Tale the Bretons Tell. 

" When the bullet struck him, he was 
looking at me.” 

" Think no more, I beg you, of St. 
Brieuc ! ” 

"Then you would have me forget the 
dead ? Every day I pray to the good 
God for those who died for the King.” 

"Yes, yes: cherish the memory of 
those who are no more. But all that is* 
dear to you is not dead. Besides your 
husband, you used to love some one 
else ; did you not ? ” 

" Ah, yes ! I call God to witness that 
I did — God who gave me a mother’s 
heart. I loved my daughter. The hand 
that gave her to me took her away.” 

"God is going to restore her to you.” 

" Why do you speak these words of 
hope ? ” 

" Because you must still entertain 
hope. I repeat it, you offend God in 
giving up hope.” 

" The tomb does not give back to the 
light of day those who go down into its 
obscurity.” 

" But your daughter did not go 
down.” 

"My Father! you have not deceived 


A Tale the Bretons Tell, 


135 


me since I came hither. Oh, do not 
deceive me now ? ” 

“ I speak to you before the altar of 
the God of truth.” 

“ My daughter still lives?’' 

“Yes She was carried away on 
Christmas night from the Turning Rock 
at Clisson.” 

“ Ah, then you know all!” cried Mar- 
garet, covering her face with her hands. 
“You know that I abandoned my child.” 
“To save its father. Margaret, God 
was not offended ; it was your duty.” 
“And you are sure that I will be par- 
doned ? ” 

“ I am certain of it.” 

“What, my isolation will end?” 

“ Yes.” 

“ I shall see my little Mary again ? ” 
“Yes: you will see her, with her six- 
teen years, her grace and her piety.” 

“ And when do you promise to give 
me so much happiness?” 

“ If I had thought you strong enough, 
I would have already given it to you.” 

“ Oh, I am strong ! See, I have with- 
stood sixteen long, long years of misfor- 
tune, of tears and anguish and woe.” 


136 A Tale the Bretons Tell \ 

" Are you strong enough to bear up 
under joy and happiness ?” 

"Joy, happiness — I no longer know 
what it is. In heaven it is to see God ; 
here below it ought to be to recover and 
to embrace one’s daughter.” 

" Embrace your daughter, then ! ” cried 
Mary, arising from her prie-dieu y and 
throwing her arms about her mother’s 
neck embrace the child for whom you 
have grieved so long, and who brings to 
you all her love ! ” 

" But this is not my little Mary : it is 
still the angel.” 

" Mother dear, look at me. See this 
medal which you fastened to my neck in 
that cruel long ago.” 

" Yes, that is true — I remember now. 
Yes, I dedicated my daughter to the 
Blessed Virgin.” 

“ And she has always watched over me, 
mother ; and to-day it is in this chapel 
consecrated to her, before this altar of 
the Comforter of the Afflicted, that I 
am restored to you, and that I bring to 
you those who found me in my cradle.” 
"Oh, you who speak to me with so 
sweet a voice — you whom I took for an 


A Tale the Bretons Tell 137 

angel, for one of the cherubim of 
heaven — you are, then, really and truly 
my child ?” 

“ Mother, does not your own heart 
plead for me, and tell you that I am ?” 

“ It tells me that if you are deceiving 
me, it will break in despair.” 

“ But you are not being deceived. 
Everyone here loves you ; and my ca- 
resses, my kisses, my tears of joy that 
bathe your cheeks and hands, should con- 
vince you that I am Mary, your daugh- 
ter, lost to you for so many years.” 

“ But who could have saved you ? — for 
now I remember it was very cold that 
night when I carried you to the Turning 
Rock. I wrapped you up as warmly as 
I could, but the chill breeze must have 
penetrated to your delicate frame and 
caused you much suffering. It might 
have killed you. But, alas ! I had to go 
to your father, and it was impossible to 
take you with me. How could you re- 
sist the bitter cold — a child so fragile as 
you were ? ” 

“ Dear mother, you placed me in the 
care of God and of the Mother of the 
afflicted, and they sent to the Turning 


138 A Tale the Bretons Tell. 

Rock these friends whom you see here. 
They found me in my cradle among the 
ferns, and took me to their home.” 

“ Where are they ? ” 

“ Here, mother,” said Mary, indicat- 
ing the father and his sons. 

“Well, may God reward them and 
pour down upon them all possible hap- 
piness ! ” she prayed, with great earnest- 
ness. 

As she pronounced these words, 
Madame Margaret raised her arms as if 
to bless the De Montmaurs ; but sud- 
denly her body stiffened, her eyes closed, 
and she fell backward into the arm-chair 
that had been placed near her prie dieu . 
The curt was at her side in an instant. 
After placing his hand on her heart, he 
said : “ The beating is rapid, but not too 

precipitate. This crisis was inevitable : 
it is the transition from misery to hap- 
piness. Let us pray for her silently; 
and when she regains consciousness, do 
you, Mary, clasp her in your arms. Dur- 
ing this species of sleep, I cherish the 
hope that her memory and reason will 
disentangle themselves from all confus- 
ing elements, and that when next she re- 


A Tale the Bretons Tell 139 

vives the dark clouds of insanity shall 
have rolled away from her mind for- 
ever.” 

All knelt and prayed fervently, and 
the tones of the organ blended with their 
earnest petitions. We have spoken of 
the expression, the soul, which character- 
ized the playing of Brother Hyacinth ; 
but never did he so faithfully interpret 
the varying emotions of the human 
heart as now. The history of the poor 
widow, which the doctor-priest had told 
him, stirred all the sympathies of his 
artist-soul ; and he had been longing for 
the moment when he might be allowed 
to test the power of his beloved art over 
the temperament of the unfortunate 
mother. When the cure signed to him 
to play, it was as if the noble instrument 
became a part of himself, and the weird 
melodies which soothed him in the days 
of his own insanity awoke again, with a 
pathos inexpressibly touching. Each 
note was a prayer that lifted his hearers 
to the Father’s throne ; and on the heart 
of the semi-unconscious patient the har- 
mony fell like vivifying raindrops on 
thirsty flowers. 


140 A Tale the Bretons Tell. 

# 

He had been playing about a quarter 
of an hour, when the widow, whose 
hands had been clasped as if in death, 
raised one of them to her forehead, then 
placed it on her heart. She gasped as 
though smothering beneath an insupport- 
able weight for a few moments, her 
bosom heaved violently; then the tears 
came, and, raising herself a little, she 
cried out loudly : 

“ Where is she ? where is she — -the 
daughter whom God has given me 
back ? ” 

“In your arms, dear mother!” cried 
Mary, throwing herself on her bosom 
and coverinof her face with kisses. 

Ah, then it was evident that Margaret 
had recovered her motherly love! No 
longer doubting the reality of her joy, 
she clasped her daughter again and again 
to her heart, fondled, caressed, and 
kissed her ; showed herself altogether 
the mother finding and embracing her 
lost child. 

It were useless to attempt a description 
of the happiness that followed this cure. 
Of the countless acts of thanksgiving 
that were wafted from earth to the 


A Tale the Bretons Tell 141 

Virgin’s throne on that last morning of 
May, none surpassed in fervor and in- 
tensity of gratitude those poured forth 
by these two favored clients of our 
Heavenly Mother, who, side by side, 
heard the cur As Mass. To make assur- 
ance doubly certain, M. De Montmaur 
decided that they should all remain in 
the village a month longer. But there 
was no relapse. The doctor-priest had 
taken time to prepare his patient for the 
great ordeal ; but once it was safely over, 
he answered for the permanence of her 
sanity. 

So mother and daughter, father and 
sons and tutor, all went home to Bre- 
tagne. The Abbe Cervon returned to 
his cathedral, with additional cause for 
extolling the charity and skill of his 
friend the curL And the cure himself 
thanked God for the good which he had 
been permitted to accomplish. 

Before the return of the Virgin’s 
Month, however, both the cure and Abbe 
Cervon paid a visit to Bretagne. M. 
De Montmaur, in inviting them, had. 
written to the cure . 

“You have restored her reason to 


142 A Tale the Bretons Tell \ 

Margaret : come now and make her 
daughter and my son George happy by 
blessing their union. Tell the good 
Abbe who led us to you, and who wit- 
nessed our anxieties, our prayers and 
tears, to come also, that he. may witness 
our joy and happiness.” 

Shortly after the receipt of this letter 
George and Mary were married in the 
Chapel of All Joys, near Clisson ; and 
immediately after the ceremony the 
whole wedding-party proceeded to the 
Turning Rock. George laughed at the 
boyish credulity, to banish which his 
father had led him to it so many years 
before ; but declared that it had proved 
to him the most fortunate superstition 
ever entertained by mortal. 

It only remains to be told that the 
most massive silver lamp to be procured 
in Paris was duly forwarded to the Hos- 
pice of St. Bernard. And if you ever 
visit the chapel there, and ask the sacris- 
tan who gave that costly ex-voto , you 
will probably hear a repetition of “ A 
Tale the Bretons Tell.” 


THE 

MADONNA OF THE EMERALD. 


One afternoon some five hundred 
years ago the mayor of Fiesole was tak- 
ing a walk round his city, enjoying the 
magnificent view which it affords of the 
valley of the Arno and Florence the 
Proud. In the course of his walk he 
came to the convent of the Friars 
Preachers, which, being a recent founda- 
tion, was not yet definitely enclosed. 
The mayor observed that the sons of St. 
Dominic had exquisite roses and other 
flowers of great beauty in their garden ; 
these were due to the devotedness of Fra 
Semplice, who in obedience to the prior 
spent his time in taking care of the plants. 

Semplice was a humble, simple soul. 
If a venial sin ever tarnished his baptis- 
mal robe, it might be one of pride in gaz- 


1 44 The Madonna of the Emerald ' 

ing on the perfumed brilliancy of his 
flowers. During Benediction and the 
processions of the Blessed Sacrament, 
when his eyes fell on the exquisite roses 
that bloomed around the tabernacle, or 
shed their leaves like a purple carpet un- 
der the dazzling rays of the remonstrance, 
it cost him an effort to suppress a feeling 
of paternal vanity, and the fancy that the 
Madonna looked with affectionate con- 
placency on the scented wreaths he laid 
at Her feet. 

This good Brother shared the enthusi- 
astic admiration the whole of Tuscany 
bestowed on the inimitable frescoes with 
wdiich a young monk called Fra Giovanni 
had decorated the ceilings and w r alls of 
the chapel and cloister ; yet poor Semp- 
lice believed, in the simplicity of his heart, 
that his roses were a purer and more 
acceptable homage to the Creator than 
the works of genius of the great master. 
Butif he could have guessed the thoughts 
of the mayor as the latter loitered round 
the garden, feasting his senses on the 
lovely children of nature, the offspring of 
the good Brothers care, he would have 
felt a pang of sorrow. 


The Madonna of the Emerald. 145 

“ What a transformation in this hill !” 
murmured the mayor ; “ it used to be full 
of briers and stones : the town never 
turned it to account, and I myself allowed 
the Fathers to take possession of it, and 
metamorphose it in this manner. Could 
I only have foreseen this, I would have 
exacted from them a thousand gold 
crowns, which would be extremely useful 
to us now, as we shall have to pay sixty 
Roman crowns for the picture of the 
Madonna to be placed over the high altar 
of the cathedral. Methinks it is not yet 
too late. I have made no le^al surrender 
of this municipal property, and should be 
acting only as a prudent administrator of 
the township if I demanded a certain sum 
from the good Fathers before formally 
conveying to them all rights over it.” 

These thoughts occupied the mind of 
the mayor during his return home, and 
for the rest of the evening. However, 
before broaching the subject to the town 
council, he thought it advisable to confer 
with the prior of the convent, and come 
to some agreement. Early next morn- 
ing, therefore, he hastened to the convent 
to set forth his views. 


146 The Madonna of the Emerald. 

The exorbitant demand fell like a 
thunderbolt on the prior, who was far 
from being worldly wise ; he readily 
admitted the rights of the town of 
Fiesole, but reminded the functionary 
that when the friars came to the place, 
it was totally uncultivated — in fact, a 
desert ; and that the silence of the 
authorities had led them to believe in an 
unconditional transfer of the land. In 
conclusion he said, humbly : “If it please 
God and your lordship to deprive us of 
our monastery, we shall bow beneath the 
rod that strikes. You know we are 
mendicants by vow and profession, and 
that our Father, St. Dominic, forebade 
hoarding money. We possess nothing; 
if you drive us from this place, our 
building will remain unfinished, and we 
will go and plant out tent wherever God 
wills.” 

“ O Father ! I never contemplated 
your leaving Fiesole, where we all re- 
spect and love you. Nevertheless, your 
paternity must desire to have the owner- 
ship of the land conveyed to you by a 
legal act ; the municipal finances do not 
allow us to make it over to you by an 


The Madonna of the Emerald, 14 7 

absolute donation ; let us try to come to 
an understanding.” 

Finally an agreement was effected, and 
the first person informed of the contract 
was Fra Giovanni, whom the prior called 
from his scaffold in the chapter-room, 
telling him to suspend his work there. 

“ Brother, the gift with which God has 
endowed you is going to be the means of 
saving our community. The township 
of Fiesole requests a large picture of our 
Blessed Lady. Set to work at it with 
your whole soul ; we are to present it as 
an altar-piece to the cathedral, and in 
exchange the town will make over to us 
the land on which our monastery stands, 
and which does not belong to us as yet by 
legal right. Will you require a model ? ” 

“ The model is there above,” whispered 
Giovanni, as he raised his eyes towards 
heaven. 

“Very well; begin at once. Fra 
Semplice will be always near, to mix 
your colors, and give you every help in 
his power.” 

The young monk bowed in acquies- 
cence, and shut himself up, with his fel- 
low-laborer, in his humble studio. Both 


148 The Madonna of the Emerald. 

knelt and prayed fervently ; gradually 
the ardent faith of the artist illuminated 
his imagination, and the ideal of the 
Virgin Mother seemed to stand before 
his easel. He seized his palette and 
brushes, and imparted to his composition 
the delicate grace and tender mysticism 
with which his heart overflowed ; there 
was nothing earthly in the beautiful 
figure which he drew, on his knees, as 
was his wont ; following his pure ideal, 
the offspring of his faith, he copied the 
Madonna he seemed to gaze upon, and 
She in turn appeared to smile upon him 
from Her starry nimbus. 

Fra Semplice, while preparing the 
ruby color for the tunic and the azure 
for the mantle, was struck with awe 
before the canvas, which every day grew 
more beautiful, and felt himself over- 
powered by a supernatural veneration, 
as if in presence of a real apparition of 
our Blessed Lady ; and when, towards 
evening, he slipped away to water his 
beloved roses, he thus replied to the 
Brothers who questioned him about the 
picture : Angelico, Angelico ! It is an 

angel that paints.” 


The Madonna of the Emerald. *49 

When Fra Giovanni had accomplished 
his task the monks and the mayor of 
Fiesole were summoned to the studio ; 
words of enthusiasm burst from them all, 
as they involuntarily fell on their knees 
and shouted with one voice: u Ave 

Maria ! Ave Maria!" The word of 
Fra Semplice seemed the fitting express- 
ion of the general admiration, and they 
all proclaimed the artist Angelico. So 
also did the mayor, who ordered the 
painting to be conveyed to the cathedral 
on the following day. 

The clergy, the municipal body, and 
the people of Fiesole came in proces- 
sion to bear away the picture of the 
Madonna. Semplice, radiant with joy, 
opened the door of the chapter-room, 
where the masterpiece had been rever- 
ently placed. A shout of admiration, 
followed by one of indignation, burst 
from the crowd : a reckless hand had 
pierced the canvas, and placed in the hand 
of the Virgin a beautiful rose heavy with 
the pearly drops of the morning dew. 
It was Fra Semplice’s innocent present 
to his loved Madonna before bidding 
Her adieu. In Italy even the common 


1 5° The Madonna of the Emerald. 


people have artistic taste, and, in spite of 
the sanctity of the place, they were not 
sparing of denunciations, and might, 
perhaps, have laid violent hands on poor 
Semplice if Fra Giovanni had not stood 
before him, and shielded him with his 
white robes. At the sight of the painter 
Semplice was forgotten, and a loud cry 
broke forth from every throat : “ An- 

gelico ! Angelico ! ” The mayor took 
from his finger an emerald of great price 
— the gift of his neighbor Cosmo di 
Medici, — and placed it where the stem of 
Brother Semplice’s rose had made a rent 
in the canvas ; and the picture was hence- 
forth called the Madonna of the Emerald. 

The artist-monk ever after retained the 
sweet name of Fra Angelico — in Florence, 
in Venice, in Orvieto, and finally in Rome, 
whither Nicholas V. called him to adorn 
the Vatican Chapel. He died in the 
Eternal City, and is buried in the Church 
of the Minerva, where a simple stone 
marks his place of rest. He remained 
humble to the end, refusing the mitre 
and even the cardinal’s hat. 


A MIDNIGHT PENITENT. 


The Feast of the Divine Maternity 
was over ; the Spouse of Christ had sung 
her song of joy and thankfulness, and 
Peace with her drowsy sister Sleep had 
descended upon earth. It was past mid- 
night in a flourishing, manufacturing city 
in one of the New England States, when 
a priest was roused from slumber by an 
incessant knocking at his front door. 
Opening his window, which was directly 
overhead, he discerned a man well ad- 
vanced in years, and asked him what 
his errand was at that late hour. 

“ Open, Father ! open ! ” was the reply. • 
u But what do you wish ? — who are 
you ? ’ 

“ I am everything that is vile and bad. 
But, oh, open, open quickly ! I want to 
go to confession/' 


1 5 2 A Midnight Penitent. 

Naturally the good priest thought the 
man had been drinking, and was about 
to bid him be off, when he remembered St. 
Philip Neri’s remark — that his “ most 
consoling conversions were made in the 
most unseasonable hours,” — and so he 
decided to admit this strange visitor, and 
see, with God’s grace, what could be done 
for him. Half in doubt and half in hope, 
therefore, be descended and threw wide 
the door. Scarcely had the importunate 
caller crossed the threshold, when he fell 
upon his knees and cried : “ O Father ! 

you see in me a most abandoned wretch 
— a villain given up to all manner of 
crime. For months I have not seen the 
inside of a church ; for twenty years I 
have not been to confession. In all that 
time there is hardly a sin which the 
enemy of souls could suggest that I have 
not committed. I have been a — every- 
thing, I believe, except a murderer. In 
this very hour I was on an errand of sin 
when my dead mother appeared to me 
and said y i Go at once to confession ” 

The man was not drunk : he had not 
even been drinking ; excited he certainly 
was ; and no wonder. The priest con- 


A Midnight Penitent . 1 53 

ducted him to a private room, and there 
with tears streaming down his cheeks, 
and every other sign of deep con- 
trition, the penitent unburthened his 
soui. 

When absolution had been given, the 
priest said to him : “ My friend, your con- 
version is as marvellous as it is consoling ; 
how do you account for it ? What good 
deed have you ever done in our Saviour’s 
name ? ” 

“ Father,’ 1 the penitent replied : “ I 

can explain the grace which I have re- 
ceived only in this way : on her death- 
bed my dear mother made me — then but 
a lad of twenty — promise to say the beads 
every day. Wicked as I have been, I 
have kept that promise faithfully — even 
when farthest on the road to perdition.” 

The mystery was explained, and the 
priest breathed an ejaculation of grati- 
tude to the Refuge of Sinners, the Queen 
of the Holy Rosary. 

Again promising with God’s help to 
make all possible atonement for the evils 
of the past, and to conform his future 
life to the precepts of Holy Mother 
Church, the midnight penitent departed. 


1 54 A Midnight Penitent. 

This is no uncertain legend, wafted 
down to us on the breezes of Time from 
the shadowy days of old : but a brief and 
simple narrative of what occurred but a 
few days ago in wide-awake America — “ a 
plain, unvarnished tale,” which was re- 
lated to me only last night by a brother 
priest, who was the instrument of Our 
Lady’s goodness. 


THE MIRACLE OF METZ.* 


Anne de Cl6ry, the subject of the ex- 
traordinary cure about to be recorded, 
was at School in the Convent of the Sa- 
cred Heart, at Metz, in the year 1855. 
She was then thirteen years of age, and 
her health and spirits good. Previously 
she had lived two years in Africa, where 
her father occupied the post of Notary- 
General to the Imperial Court at Algiers. 
Madame de Clery’s health having suf- 
fered from the climate, she returned to 
Metz with her two daughters, the younger 
of whom — Anne — was very uneasy about 
her mother’s health, and prayed fervently 
for her recovery, offering herself to suf- 


* The account here given is from a small tractate pub- 
lished under this title, with the imprimatur of the Bishop 
of Metz. 


156 The Miracle of Metz. 

fer the pains of sickness in her stead. 
The sacrifice was accepted. 

Anne’s illness, which was of a very dis- 
tressing nature, commenced in the Holy 
Week of 1856, and continued steadily to 
increase, in spite of the prescriptions of 
the first physicians at Metz, Aix in Sa- 
voy, and Paris. Remedies of every pos- 
sible kind — some of them of a terribly se- 
vere character — were tried, but without 
the smallest result, except to increase the 
sufferings of the poor patient. The Paris 
physician, at length (in the year 1857), 
pronounced her case to be incurable. 
He said : “ Mile. Anne is laboring under 
the disease known by the name of ‘ mus- 
cular and atrophica! paralysis.’ I very 
much apprehend that no remedies can 
touch the disease.” 

The sufferings of the poor girl were 
continuous and severe. Her limbs were 
deprived of power and strength ; they 
shrunk and contracted, and the muscles 
under each knee produced a sort of knot, 
which no power on earth could untie. 
She would be, as far as man could fore- 
see, a cripple as long as she lived. Anne 
de Clery was, however, resigned to the 


The Miracle of Metz . 


157 . 


will of God, and supported her heavy 
trial by a deep piety and constant prayer. 
At times her faith suggested the possibil- 
ity of a miraculous cure, but she scarcely 
hoped or wished for such an extraordi- 
nary favor. She had a particular devotion 
to the Blessed Sacrament, and every 
week a priest brought her Holy Com- 
munion, which was her greatest support 
and consolation. 

She employed her time, when able 
(though in the recumbent position, and 
unable to lift her head), in embroidering 
altar cloths, and making artificial flowers 
for the adornment of the sanctuary. It 
was while thus preparing for the devotion 
known as the Forty Hours, in the Par- 
ochial Church of St. Martin at Metz, in 
the year 1865, that the thought sometimes 
crossed her mind that she might be cured 
by the Blessed Sacrament ; but she was 
slow to encourage an idea which might 
be an illusion, and deprive her of her res- 
ignation and peace of mind. 

The devotion above mentioned was to 
take place on the 12th, 13th, and 14th of 
June. On the first two days it was im- 
possible to carry her to the church 


158 The Miracle of Metz. 

(whither she had not been taken for a 
long while), her pains were so severe ; 
but on the third day, with the greatest 
difficulty, and at the cost of much suffer- 
ing, after having received Communion, 
she was carried to the church by her maid 
Clementine, who sat on a bench, and held 
her on her knees. Madame de Cleryand 
Mile, de Coetlosquet knelt close beside 
her ; but neither the patient nor her 
friends were expecting the extraordinary 
event about to follow. 

After a few moments’ rest Anne be- 
came absorbed in devotion, and prayed, 
as she had often done at the moment of 
Communion : “ Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou 
canst cure me.” At the same instant she 
felt so violent a pain in her whole body, 
that it was all she could do not to scream 
out. She prayed for strength to bear it, 
and resigned herself to God’s will. Then 
she says, she felt filled with faith and hope, 
and became conscious that she was cured. 
Anne threw herself immediately upon 
her knees, and said to her companions, 
“ Pray, pray ! I am cured !” Madame 
de Clbry, overcome with emotion, in a 
state of bewilderment, led her daughter 


159 


The Miracle of Metz . 

out of the church, scarcely believing the 
evidence of her senses when she saw her 
standing alone, and able to walk. She 
ascertained that the knots under her 
daughters knees had entirely disap- 
peared ; and then Anne returned to the 
church, where she remained kneeling in 
praise and thanksgiving before the 
Blessed Sacrament for three-quarters of 
an hour, without feeling the least fa- 
tigue. 

o 

Her cure was complete ; all the ail- 
ments that had afflicted her disappeared, 
leaving- behind no trace of illness. 
Eleven days after her cure, Anne walked 
through the streets of Metz in a process- 
ion of the Blessed Sacrament (which 
lasted an hour and a quarter), to the as- 
tonishment and admiration of all who had 
known her former sad condition. Her 
physician, when he saw her rise and walk 
to meet him, said ; “ Mademoiselle, what 
men could not effect, God has done.” 


AN EXTRAORDINARY ANSWER 

TO PRAYER. 


The popular sentiment in Turin is 
that the late lamented Don Rosco per- 
formed miracles ; our Holy Mother the 
Church will probably pronounce, later, 
on the character of the marvellous events 
in the life of the servant of God. One 
extraordinary answer to prayer, of which 
there are many living witnesses, is too re- 
markable to be left unrecorded. The 
incident occurred in 1877. 

Giuseppa Loughi was then ten years 
old. She had been paralyzed for sev- 
eral years in consequence of violent con- 
vulsions ; her right arm was inert, she 
could not stand erect, and had lost the 
power of speech. Her mental facul- 
ties seemed also impaired, and all the 
remedies prescibed by physicians were 


Extraordinary Answer to Prayer. 161 

unavailing. Her pious mother had 
recourse to Mary, Help of Christians. 
On the 23d of May, the eve of the feast 
on which Holy Church invokes Our 
Lady under this sweet title, the poor 
woman carried her afflicted child to 
the shrine of the Valdocco to implore 
a hitherto hopeless cure. She then went 
to Don Bosco, that he might read over 
the invalid the blessing of Our Lady 
Help of Christians. On that evening 
the abode of the sainted priest was 
thronged with visitors, who were all 
melted to compassion at the sight of the 
unfortunate child. Her sufferings were 
pitiable : she could neither stand nor sit 
and, in spite of her mothers vigilant eye, 
every moment she fell to one side or the 
other. On seeing the crowd that pre- 
ceded her, and considering her daugh- 
ters condition, the mother thought she 
could not wait her turn, and was prepar- 
ing to leave with a heavy heart, when 
those present, forgetting their own neces- 
sities, offered to let her pass in before 
them. 

The one to first propose this kind act 
was a crentleman belonofina- to a noble 

o 00 


162 Extraordinary Answer to Prayer . 

family of Piedmont, an active promoter 
of every good work in Turin; he was 
president of the Conference of St. Vincent 
de Paul and was invested with all the dig- 
nities his fellow citizens could bestow. 
He had pondered a noble resolve in his 
heart ; but, mistrustful of his merits, and 
considering his age, he still hesitated to 
answer what he thought must be God’s 
call. This call was to enter the Salesian 
Congregation. Several times he had 
come to Don Bosco for advice, laying 
before him what he considered his voca- 
tion, and begging for his prayers ; the 
holy man would give no decisive answer, 
waiting for God to manifest His will. 
On this day Count Cays de Giletta had 
come to insist anew, and obtain a final 
answer. When the stricken child entered 
Don Bosco’s room, he said to himself ; 
“ If she come out cured, I will enter the 
congregation ; I will take it as a sign of 
God’s will — my hesitation will be at an 
end," 

Giuseppa was carried before Don 
Bosco; and laid upon a sofa ; her mother 
explained her complicated ailments. The 
saintly priest exhorted the poor woman 


Extraordinary Answer to Prayer.i6$ 

to confidence in Mary’s tender mercy, and 
told her to kneel down while he pro- 
nounced on the little invalid the blessing 
of Mary Auxilium Christianorum. He 
then commanded the child to make the 
Sign of the Cross ; she was about to obey 
with her left hand, but Don Bosco 
quickly interposed: “ No, not the left 
hand, child ; you must use your right 
hand.” 

“ Her right hand is paralyzed,” ob- 
served the mother. 

“ Let us see if it is.” And he repeated 
his injunction to the little girl. She then 
lifted her paralyzed arm, raised her hand 
to her forehead, then to her chest, and to 
her left and right shoulders. 

“ Bravo !” exclaimed Don Bosco : 
“you have made the Sign of the Cross 
well ; but you have not said the words. 
Now repeat the sign, and pronounce the 
words as I do myself — In the name of 
the Father, and of the Son, and of the 
Holy Ghost. Amen.” 

The child, who had been dumb for 
more than a month, found her tongue 
loosed : she repeated the sign and pro- 
nounced the words ; then in an ecstasy 


164 Extraordinary Answer to Prayer . 

of joy she exclaimed : “ O mother ! the 
Blessed Virgin has cured me.” 

On hearing these words, the over- 
joyed mother could only weep. 

“ Now that the good Virgin has cured 
you,” continued Don Bosco, “ make 
haste to thank Her, and recite from the 
bottom of your heart an Ave Maria .” 
Giuseppa recited the prayer very de- 
voutly, in a distinct voice ; however, this 
was not enough ; it was yet to be seen if 
she could stand and walk. He told her 
to walk round the room; she did so sev- 
eral times, with a firm step. In fact, the 
cure was complete and perfect. The lit- 
tle girl, unable any longer to contain her 
exuberant gratitude, rushed to the door, 
arid, throwing it open, showed herself to 
the people, who a few minutes before had 
beheld her a cripple. 

“ Thank the Madonna with me, signore; 
Her mercy has cured me. See, I can 

move my hand ; I can walk, I suffer no 
• »> 
pain. 

This spectacle, and the words accom- 
panying it, caused an indescribable emo- 
tion in all present ; they gathered round 
the favored child — the miracolata y as they 


Extraordinary Answer to Prayer. 165 


called her, — some weeping, others pray- 
ing aloud, and giving glory to God. 
Don Bosco himself was overcome with 
emotion, and trembled from head to foot. 
The mother and child soon took their 
departure, to return thanks at the shrine 
of their Benefactress. 

The good Count now thought within 
himself, “ Evidently the Blessed Virgin 
wishes me to become a Salesian.” With- 
out delay he entered the novitiate, and 
set himself with ardor to the practice of 
poverty, humility, and mortification as 
prescribed in the rules of the institute. 
After the lapse of a certain time, how- 
ever, his former scruples regarding his 
vocation returned. He began to doubt if 
he was doing God’s will. Don Bosco, who 
had been so cautious about deciding on 
his vocation, now strenuously encouraged 
the troubled novice to persevere, rec- 
ognizing in these scruples the effects 
of Satan against a generous soul. The 
novice, disheartened by interior aridity 
and violent temptations, found it difficult 
to believe in the discernment of his spirit- 
ual Father ; he knew that he had asked 
as a sign, the cure of Giuseppa ; but per- 


1 66 Extraordinary Answer to Prayer . 

haps, suggested the evil spirit, the cure 
was not a permanent one. Then again 
the novice would reproach himself with 
credulity and pride in imagining that God 
had sent him a particular mark as an 
assurance of his vocation. 

One morning, as the heavy-hearted 
religious was crossing the sacristy of the 
Salesian church, he met a young girl, 
with her parents, coming to make an 
offering. Approaching him, she said : 
" Don’t you know me, signor ?” 

"Are you Giuseppa Loughi ? ” exclaimed 
the novice, thrilled with joy at this unex- 
pected answer to his doubts ; “ has the 
cure lasted ? ” 

“ I am in perfect health ; I can speak, 
I can walk, I can write, I can study and 
work as if I had never been ill a day.” 

“ Look at her,” added the mother ; 
“ see her rosy cheeks ; she eats with a 
good appetite, I assure you. Our neigh- 
bors all agree with us that her recovery 
was a real miracle.” 

The Count felt himself pervaded by 
a supernatural peace ; his trial was at an 
end ; his resolution to persevere in the 
Salesian Congregation never again wa- 


Extraordinary Answer to Prayer . 167 

vered, and for the remainder of his life he 
edified the community by his many Christ- 
ian and religious virtues, the most con- 
spicuous of which were his humility and 
generosity in serving God. 


THE 

LEGEND OFTHE GHOSTLY MASS. 


It was the ist of November. After 
the solemnities of the Feast of All Saints 
were over, the worshippers hurried home- 
ward, eager to regain their fireside, and 
seek shelter against the threatening 
storm, which seemed the hasty precursor 
of the approaching commemoration of 
All Souls ; an icy wind scattered afar the 
yellow leaves that strewed the ground, — 
last relics of spring time ; while a univer- 
sal sadness seemed to pervade Nature, 
and prepare the soul for the melancholy 
services of the morrow. 

But the feelings of depression which 
the evening inspired were increased ten- 
fold by a contemplation of the ruins of 
the ancient abbey, with its broken arches, 
its deserted cloister, and its abandoned 


The Legend of the Ghostly Mass . 169 

cemetery. Once thousands of monks 
had chanted therein, day and night, the 
oraises of God ; there mitred abbots, 
learned and holy men, had presided at the 
glorious and touching ceremonies of the 
Church, — there were naught now re- 
mained save the remnants of the abbey 
church and a bell-tower, the shadow of 
which still fell over the ancient burial- 
ground of the monks. The neighboring 
peasants came, occasionally, to pray at 
the foot of the cross in the neglected 
cemetery ; while in the belfry a silvery- 
toned bell, which had escaped the notice 
of the ruthless plunderers of the Revolu- 
tion, still rang forth the call to God’s 
service ; for the poor little village church, 
scarcely recovered from the national dis- 
asters, possessed neither belfry nor bell. 

Maclou, the bell-ringer and sacristan 
of the humble church, which was too 
poor to give him any salary for his 
double functions, had laid out the black 
vestments for the commemoration of the 
dead, and had brought into operation all 
the resources of his long experience and 
of his zealous devotion towards the souls 
of the faithful departed ; he ranged the 


170 The Legend of the Ghostly Mass. 

waxen torches round the empty catafal- 
que, surveyed his preparations with a 
satisfied air; and set out for the belfry 
of the cemetery, to toll the knell of the 
parting day. The old bell of the monks 
vibrated and rang forth, as in centuries 
gone by, to the country round : “ Pray, 
pray for the departed ! ” And at every 
fireside each one made the Sign of the 
Cross, and responded to the sound of the 
bell with a De profundis. That evening 
neither laughter nor song was heard 
throughout the village, since there was 
no household without the memory of 
some place left vacant by the fell reaper, 
Death. 

Night reigned in utter darkness over 
the abbey ruins ; all was silent, and the 
triple covering of moss woven by time 
over the sepulchral slabs deadened even 
the steps of an old man walking slowly 
among them. He was the aged priest 
who acted as pastor of the church, — a 
living wreck escaped from the persecu- 
tion. He remembered the closing days 
of the monastery wherein he had been a 
novice, and where he was now sole guar- 
dian of its ruins. He had preserved un- 


The Legend of the Ghostly Mass . 1 7 1 

dimmed the ardor of eternal youth, daily 
renewed at the altar ; the people knew 
him as “ the Saint,” and it was declared 
that sometimes, when at prayer, his fore- 
head shone brilliantly. 

At the toll of the knell the monk had 
recited the Penitential Psalms ; then, 
drawn by some mysterious attraction, 
heedless of the intense cold, he had come 
thither amid the ruins, to pray for those 
who had formerly been his brethren in 
religion. Kneeling before the remains 

o o 

of the altar, he invoked the efficacy of 
the countless Masses celebrated upon 
those crumbling slabs of marble, and 
prayed long and fervently for the de- 
ceased religious buried beneath the pave- 
ment, who had none that would remem- 
ber them. 

The hours glided by ; gradually the 
last fires were extinguished, the hearth 
stones grew cold, slumber had closed all 
eyes, yet Maclou, the bell-ringer, contin- 
ued still to toll. 

“Toll, toll, Maclou!” whispered an in- 
terior voice; “the longer you ring the 
bell, the more prayers will be said for the 
dead.” 


1 72 The Legend of the Ghostly Mass . 


But Maclou answered to himself ; 
“ What use is it? All are asleep.” 

“ Who knows,” continued the voice, 
“ but some one may possibly awake dur- 
ing the night to pray for the departed ? 
Toll, toll on!” 

“ I will ; my bell is my prayer.” 

And Maclou resumed his task. And 
the longer he tolled, standing beneath 
the ancient porch, the more energy he 
felt ; a kind of supernatural strength 
seemed to animate him ; he experienced 
not the slightest fatigue ; and,* calling to 
mind the many dead whom he had ac- 
companied to the cemetery, the harmo- 
nious rhythm of his bell, like the sough of 
the waves on a sandy beach, transformed 
his ideas into revery. 

‘ My turn will come,” he said, slowly ; 
“ I am over sixty. Lord, grant that I be 
prepared when my hour draws near ! ” 
And his head drooped upon his breast, 
his limbs bent under him ; he sank upon 
the ground ; the rope slipped from his 
fingers, and the last tones of the knell 
died away in the fog. 

Meanwhile at the foot of the altar the 
priest knelt in an ecstasy of prayer : he 


The Legend of the Ghostly Mass . 1 73 

was lost to all sounds of earth, and, not 
perceiving that the death-knell had 
ceased, continued his fervent supplica- 
tions. The clock rang out midnight; 
All Souls’ Day was ushered in, and at the 
last stroke of the hour a mysterious breath 
passed over the cemetery, similar to that 
which astonished the Prophet Ezekiel. 
A strange noise issued from those silent 
tombs. The dark plain undulated like 
the ocean when swollen by a tempest ; 
the willows wept, the cypresses moaned, 
and the yews shook their branches, as if 
in agonies of ofrief. There was a rus- 

o o 

tling of winding-sheets, an indefinable 
crashing, as of breaking boughs. Soon 
a spectre emerged from the tombs, then 
another, still another, then ten, twenty, a 
hundred at once. These phantoms came 
forth from the cemetery, from the clois- 
ter, from the pavement of the sanctuary, — 
all wearing the monastic habit ; there 
were likewise the benefactors of the con- 
vent in their worldly attire, and some 
choir-boys clothed in white surplices. 
All gradually penetrated into the nave 
(which grew sufficiently spacious to con- 
tain them), and found places in the stalls, 


1 74 The Legend of the Ghostly Mass . 

in the choir, and around the broken col- 
umns. 

The aged priest prayed on ; strange to 
say, the awesome spectacle had no ter- 
rors for him ; he understood that under 
these sensible forms the departed mem- 
bers of his monastery solicited suffrages. 
One of the spectres bore the abbatial 
mitre and crosier, and, advancing toward 
the kneeling figure, said, authoritatively : 
“ Living priest of the Living God, in the 
Name of Our Lord Jesus Christ take 
these vestments and this chalice, and 
offer at the altar the Holy Sacrifice for 
the dead who surround you.” 

The altar was prepared, the tapers 
lighted, and the vestments laid in order. 
A thrill of joy pervaded the assembly when 
the monk, obedient as of old, approached 
the altar; but when he began, “ Introibo 
ad altare Dei” no one present could 
answer him ; the Sacrifice of the living 
may not be served by the dead. “Intro- 
ibo ad altare Dei,” repeated the priest, 
still . louder ; yet no voice broke the 
silence. Anxiety now took possession 
of the assemblage, and lamentations re- 
sounded on every side ; the Sacrifice ac- 


The Legend of the Ghostly Mass . 175 

corded them could not be accom- 
plished. 

Maclou slept on — the steps of the dead 
do not awake the living ; he had heard 
naught of that terrible thrill which had 
accompanied the entrance of so many 
spirits. But when the priest repeated 
for the third time, yet more loudly, “ In- 
troibo ad altare Deid Maclou awoke ; he 
perceived the church filled, the priest 
alone at the altar, and, without further 
thought, understood that his pastor 
needed his services, and in a loud voice 
he answered, as usual : “Ad Deum , qui 
Icztificat juventutem meant.” And, mak- 
ing his way towards the altar, he knelt to 
serve a Mass such as he had never before 
witnessed. 

At the Dies Irce strange voices sounded 
forth unknown canticles; an organ, 
touched by an unearthly hand, gave out 
terrible tones, as of thunder ; the granite 
arches of the vaulted roof, and the col- 
umns beneath the cross-springers, vibrated 
in unison, like the chords of a harp ; it 
was a concert of the unseen world. Si- 
lence followed; the consecrated Host 
was slowly elevated, then the chalice, 


1/6 The Legend of the Ghostly Mass . 

and all bowed in adoration ; when the 
heads were raised a smile played over the 
sad faces, and angels appeared, who 
marked each with the Blood of the chal- 
ice. Ere long the priest, turning towards 
the people, pronounced: u Requiescant 

in paceL 

“ Amen repeated Maclou, and forth- 
with the vision disappeared ; the candles 
were extinguished on the altar ; the 
tombs were silent, and in the depths of 
the sky the souls were seen rising up- 
ward like radiant stars. “ Et vidimus 
gloriam ej us, plenum gratice et veritatis." 
And myriad voices responded with exul- 
tation, “ Deo gratiasT 

No one remained save the abbot, who 
had ordered the monk to celebrate the 
Holy Sacrifice. Approaching with an 
air of majestic dignity, he blessed the 
celebrant, and, turning to Maclou, said : 
“ My son, you have powerfully aided us 
by serving this Mass, wherein the God of 
Mercy has graciously deigned to concen- 
trate all the merit of numberless func- 
tions ; and in recompense of your charity 
the Lord permits me to bear you to 
heaven.” And with his icy hand, colder 


The Legend of the Ghostly Mass. 177 

than mountain snow, the abbot signed 
the Cross on his forehead. 

“ And will you not also take me to the 
Promised Land?” asked the celebrant. 

“ No : your hour is not yet come ; you 
must still open heaven to others of our 
brethren, who cannot now join us; and 
you must increase otherwise the number 
of those that will welcome you on high.” 

The next morning the peasants, sum- 
moned by their saintly parish priest, 
came to bear off old Maclou, who had 
expired while sounding the knell during 
the eve of All Souls’. The Office for 
the Dead was duly recited, and under 
the catafalque which he had raised and 
ornamented with his own hands on the 
day previous, the body of the aged sac- 
ristan rested in peace ; his soul was al- 
ready in the abode of the blessed. Later, 
on the spot where Maclou had breathed 
his last, the old priest succeeded in rais- 
ing a humble chapel, dedicated to the 
Souls in Purgatory, where he daily said 
Mass for the dead, especially for his 
brethren in the adjoining cemetery who 
yet awaited deliverance. 

Finally, after persevering for some 


178 The Legend of the Ghostly Mass . 

time in his pious practice, and in his 
efforts to extend devotion to the Holy 
Souls, he became dangerously ill, and on 
the evening of the following Festival of 
All Saints lay in his agony. The faithful 
began the prayers for the dying ; towards 
midnight he was believed to be peace- 
fully expiring, and they began the prayer 
for the recommendation of the soul. 
“ Subvegite, Sane ti Dei ; occur rite angel id 
And the saints undoubtedly obeyed the 
invocation ; for the dying man once 
more opened his eyes to a sight which 
shed indescribable joy over his features, 
alreadv glazed in death. 

“ What is it ? — what do you see ? ” 
asked those present. And the dying 
saint, in an ecstasy that arrested death, 
said: “ It is the ‘Mass of the Ghosts!’ 
Oh ! how beautiful, amid the ruins of the 
abbey ! I had gone thither to pray for 
my brethren.” Then, in clear and dis- 
tinct accents, he related the incident 
given above, adding, “ The server was 
Maclou, the bell-ringer, who was tolling 
the knell for the dead, and who was per- 
mitted to join their blessed train. It is 
now my turn.” So saying, he expired ; 



The Legend of the Ghostly Mass . 179 

his soul went, without doubt, to swell the 
assembly of the saints in heaven, who 
owed their speedy deliverance to his 
charitable prayers ; while amid the dark- 
ness of the night an invisible hand tolled 
the bell of the ruined monastery, ringing 
forth a strange, strange knell, so that all 
remarked : “ The bell tolls as only 

Maclou knew how to ring it — sadly yet 
joyously.” 


BARRY'S CHRISTMAS GIFT. 


i. 

The joys of the gladsome Christmas- 
tide were brightening many homes in 
many lands on the night of December 24, 
1820. Lights shone from the windows, 
and lightened the darkness without. 
Over the mountain of Great St. Bernard 
in the Pennine Alps the night was set- 
tling down, dark and stormy. The ther- 
mometer registered 2 0 below zero ; in 
some places on the perilous Pass the 
snow, already five feet deep, was deepen- 
ing as the night advanced. This Pass of 
Mons Jovis, through which marched the 
Romans, Charlemagne, and Frederick 
Barbarossa, and along which, in 1800, 
Napoleon led his army of 30,000 men, is 
still the dread of travellers. Like a 


Barry s Christmas Gift . 1 8 1 

dragon of old it waits and watches for its 
victims. Its giddy precipices yawn and 
its beetling rocks frown on the hardihood 
of those who brave its terrors. 

Far up the mountain, nearly 8,000 feet 
above the sea level, stands the Hospice 
of St. Bernard. Here live those noble 
men, the monks of St. Augustine, who, 
enduring hardship and want, sacrifice 
their lives to rescue from death the vic- 
tims of Mons Jovis Pass. When heavy 
fogs come or blinding snows the Brothers 
set forth with their brave dogs to search 
for lost travellers. They visit the huts 
erected here and there as places of ref- 
uge ; or the swift-footed, keen-nosed 
beasts, going where their master cannot 
follow, discover many a wanderer. It 
may be he is nearly buried in some drift ; 
it may be he lies on the brink of some 
frightful precipice ; it matters not : if he 
still lives, dogs and masters would give 
their lives to save his. 

The grim-looking hospice, with its dark 
stone walls, tells little of the kindness 
and charity within. Its ample dimen- 
sions, spacious enough to accommodate 
five hundred persons, are outspread on 


1 82 Barry's Christmas Gift . 

the shore of an ice-bound lake. On this 
wild December night cheering beams 
of light penetrated the darkness from 
the shutterless windows of the building, 
and the snow-flakes scintillated as they 
crossed the radiant paths. 

In this house no scene of mirth and 
merriment celebrated the night when 
Our Lord was born. The dark walls of 
the refectory were lighted by the blaze 
from the roaring fire ; the tables were 
drawn aside, and straw strewn on the 
floor ; everywhere was movement and 
bustle, as the Brothers prepared to set 
forth on their charitable mission. 

One of the monks took no part in the 
preparations. He sat on a bench by the 
chimney, reading of that time 


“ In the winter wild 
While the heaven-born Child, 

All meanly wrapped, in the rude manger lies. 
Nature in awe of Him 
Had doffed her gaudy trim, „ 

With her great Master so to sympathize. 


On such a night as this, a month be- 
fore the reader with one of the dogs, had 
rescued and carried to the hospice a 


Barry's Christmas Gift . 183 

young man overtaken by the storm. 
Brother Francis had never recovered 
from the exposure and fatigue. The 
young man, through the care bestowed 
upon him by the monks, was soon en- 
abled to go on his way rejoicing, but his 
rescuer was now waiting a greater deliv- 
erer from his pain. He said little; he 
only sat by the chimney reading his 
book, or gazing into the fire with wistful 
eyes. But he was always ready with a 
smile for others, and a word of encour- 
agement, often as effectual as more prac- 
tical help. He laid his book down now, 
to watch with a gentle smile the busy 
picture around him. 

The dogs were showing great signs of 
great impatience, whining and running to 
the door, barely standing long enough for 
the monks to fasten upon them the flasks 
whose contents were to revive some 
perishing wanderer. One large, fine- 
looking dog, with a noble, patient face, 
was standing a little apart from his com- 
panions, and, unlike them, quietly wait- 
ing the departure. He comprehended 
that any delay was for the best, and that 
the impatience of the other dogs retarded 


1 84 Barry's Christmas Gift . 

the preparations. His bright eyes wist- 
fully followed the Brothers’ movements, 
and now and then his eagerness did over- 
come, a little, his self-command, so that 
he started forward with a remonstrating 
whine, but always checked himself, and 
resumed his old position. Finally he 
gravely stalked across the hall, and thrust 
his cold nose into Brother Francis’ hand, 
mutely asking why he was not going with 
them as of old. This dog was Barry, the 
noblest St. Bernard that has ever lived a 
life of canine self-devotion, through 
whose instrumentality not less than forty 
persons have been saved. 

At last the preparations were com- 
plete ; the dogs, knowing what was ex- 
pected of them, stood motionless by the 
door while the Father supplicated that 
they might all be defended from “the 
perils and dangers of this night, for the 
love of our Saviour Jesus Christ.” A 
deep “ Amen ” sounded through the hall. 
There was a brief pause, while all still 
knelt, well knowing that they might 
never again perform the impressive little 
service ; then the doors were opened, the 
dogs rushed out, the monks followed, 


Barry s Christmas Gift . 185 

and Brother Francis was left alone, sit- 
ting by the fire, with deep peace in his 
heart and a prayer on his lips. 


II. 

The little village of Martingy on the 
Swiss side of the Alps, and Aosta on the 
Italian, mark the terminations of the 
Pass of St. Bernard. At Martigny the 
ascent commences, and ends on the crest 
of the mountain about six miles beyond 
the village. 

Four hours before the monks set forth 
on their expedition three persons were to 
be seen hurrying toward the mountain on 
the road from Martigny. The ascent 
was already becoming wearisome. Be- 
hind them lay the valley, with Martigny 
in the distance ; its queer little chalets , 
their roofs weighed down with stones, 
might be dimly descried. Before the 
travellers were the eternal Alpine snows, 
where towered the head of lofty St. 
Bernard. Far to the east stood white- 
capped Mt. Rosa. To the north lay a 


1 86 Barry s Christmas Gift. 

great bank of dark clouds, rapidly ad- 
vancing. Ever and anon the little group 
paused and anxiously regarded the 
threatening heavens. The party con- 
sisted of a man, a woman, and little boy. 
The man, evidently a guide, seemed en- 
deavoring to dissuade the woman from 
proceeding. 

“ Do you not see,” said he, "that it is 
certain death to go on ? With such a 
cloud as that, it will be quite dark in an 
hour, and if it snows we shall be lost.” 

“ But,” answered the woman, “ I must 
go on. I tell you my husband is dying 
at Aosta ; I must reach him to-mor- 
row.” 

" Consider your child, Mere Wiss,” 
continued the guide. “ It is folly to ex- 
pose him to such dangers. On a night 
! ike this we should freeze if we lost our 
way.” 

Silence ensued, and for half an hour 
they walked on steadily. The road was 
becoming rugged and steep, and the 
clouds closing in around the party, when 
the guide stopped and spoke again. 

“ Mere Wiss,” he said, resolutely, “ I 
cannot and will not go on. It is certain 


Barry s Christmas Gift . 187 

death to climb Mons Jovis to-night. Be 
wise and return ere it is too late.” 

“ Man,” said the almost frantic woman, 
“ will you leave a distracted wife and her 
delicate child to climb the Pass alone in 
the night-time ? ” 

o 

“ Yes,” replied the man : “ I am not go- 
ing to risk my life.” And he turned away. 

“ God forgive your faithlessness !” said 
the poor woman, choking back a sob. 
“ My child, we will do the best we can 
alone. Your father must not die without 
me. Heaven grant that we reach the 
hospice to-night ! ” And the white-faced 
mother, taking her boy by the hand, re- 
sumed the weary ascent. The snow be- 
gan to fall, and the air, before mild, grew 
very cold. The little boy spoke only 
once ; looking up to his mothers face, he 
asked : 

“ Mother, isn’t to-morrow Christmas ? ” 

“ Yes, my child ! ” 

“ That is a holyday, and last year we 
went to Mass, and fathef was at home. 
Will he be home to-morrow?” 

The mother said not a word ; she only 
pressed a kiss on the little boy’s lips, and 
silently breathed a prayer. 


1 88 


Barry s Christmas Gift. 

The night grew darker ; the wind 
howled among the pines, while the driv- 
ing snow nearly blinded the travellers. 
Little Pierre, terrified, clung to his 
mother. 

“ Oh, let’s go back ! ” he wailed. “ I 
am so cold, and I want my supper.” 

The mother stopped. “ Here, my boy, 
I have some bread in my pocket. Now 
while you eat that can you not go on ? 
It is only a little way to the hospice, and 
there the good monks will give you a 
warm bed and some broth.” 

Little Pierre ceased to cry while he 
munched his bread. For some time 
longer they struggled on. The snow 
grew deeper, and the walking more diffi- 
cult. Finally the child could hardly 
draw his little legs out of the drifts. 
With a sigh the mother raised him in her 
arms. He was a heavy weight, and some- 
times she staggered and almost fell. 
But her child nestled against her, and she 
endured through her mother’s love. 

“ Surely, ” she thought, “ the next turn 
will show the lights of the hospice. I 
can bear it a little longer.” 

Still the snow fell and the air grew 


Barry s Christmas Gift . 189 

colder. The ground was much rougher, 
and it was quite dark. The wind wrapped 
the woman’s skirts about her, so as to im- 
pede her movements. She was becoming 
very sleepy, and the thought of lying 
down to rest even in the snow afforded 
relief. Only for the sake of her child she 
nerved herself to resist the longing. 
Sleep, she knew, would end in a fatal tor- 
por, and so she struggled on. 

“ Oh ! why do I not see the lights of 
the hospice ? ” she moaned. “ Father 
in heaven, have mercy ! Holy Mother, 
help us ! ” 

Suddenly both the wanderers felt a 
heavy blow. The boy roused himself 
with a cry. 

“ Who is there ? ” said the mother. 
“ Oh, answer me ! Save us, for Mary’s 
sake ! ” 

There was no reply. She placed the 
boy on his feet, and, too numbed for fear 
advanced feebly with hands outstretched. 
They touched something hard ; it was a 
tree. A tree on the road ! How could 
that be? Had she then lost her way? 
Turning, she found others ; evidently she 
had wandered from the road in the dark. 


1 90 Barry's Christmas Gift. 

“ It can be only a little way off,” she 
thought. “ Pierre dear, mother is going 
to leave you here a moment. You will 
not be afraid, will you ? See, I will wrap 
my shawl about you.” 

The woman drew the shawl from her 
own shoulders to put it around her child. 

“Now if you hear me call, you must 
answer, ‘ Here I am, mother.” 

The little boy sleepily repeated, “ Here 
I am, mother.” Then with a deep sigh 
his mother seated him at the foot of a 
tree, and went in search of the road. 

At first the child was frightened, but 
he restrained his tears, and gazed into 
the darkness with wide-open eyes. Soon 
however, his lids began to droop and the 
stupor overcame him. Once he heard a 
dull, roaring sound, and thought his 
mother called. He roused himself to an- 
swer, “Here I am, mother;” but only 
the wind replied, and he dropped asleep 
again. 

Poor child, that dull sound was his 
mother’s knell. She had found the road, 
feeling her way, and saw, far up the 
mountain, the gleam of lights from the 
hospice. In her joy she heeded not the 


Barry s Christmas Gift . 19 1 

roar of an avalanche, which, sweeping 
down the mountain, buried her in its 
snowy depths. 

• • • • • • 

Deeper grows the little boy’s sleep. 
The wind dies away, the snow ceases to 
fall, and the stars, in the deep blue above, 
make a faint light : but the cold is more 
intense. Help must soon come, or the 
little boy will never wake in this world. 

A dog is bounding down the Pass. 
Now he stops, and, with uplifted head 
snuffs the air, then with loud barks he 
runs on again. He, too, had heard the 
woman’s cry ere the pitiless snow had 
made her grave. Barry — for it is he — 
well knew the meaning of such a cry. 
Soon he turns to the left, and enters the 
woods. Now pausing, now running on 
again, he reaches the little boy. With a 
pleased bark he puts his nose into the 
child’s face. There is no answering move. 
Barry understands that it is a desperate 
case. With his feet he rolls the child 
over and over till he is thoroughly awaked 
and crying with fear. Then Barry dashes 
back to the road, and barks for the 
monks; but they do not come. His 


1 9 2 Barry s Christmas Gift . 

dog’s mind is perplexed. What can he 
do with the little boy ? 

Suddenly he has an idea. He bounds 
back to little Pierre. As gently as 
would a nurse he seeks to assure the 
child of his kind intentions, till Pierre 
nestles against his great, warm body. 
Then Barry springs up and runs a few 
paces, waiting to be followed : but the 
snow is too deep for the little boy to 
walk, so the dog returns and lies down. 
The child draws near him, and places his 
arms around the shaggy neck. Again 
Barry rises and starts away this time 
dragging the child after him. Pierre be- 
gins to cry, and again Barry lies down. 

Several times the performance is re- 
peated, till the boy determined not to 
be deserted, climbs up on the dog’s 
back. Joyfully Barry trots away, Pierre 
holding tightly to his neck, and pressing 
his feet against the warm sides, while 
surely and safely they near the twinkling 
lights of the hospice. 


Barry s Christmas Gift . 


! 93 


III. 

The fire was burning low in the refec- 
tory. Brother Francis sat by the chim- 
ney, musing, as he waited for the monks’ 
return. His thoughts were far away in 
Bethlehem of Juda, where, eighteen hun- 
dred years before, a child was lying in a 
manger. What peace and happiness had 
that Babe brought! He had come in 
winter’s cold, “ a Light to lighten the 
darkness.” “ And in His name,” mused 
Brother Francis, “ this house now stands, 
to lighten the darkness of this mountain’s 
winter of snow.” 

A child’s cry and a noise of scratching 
sounded at the door. Brother Francis 
started up, and painfully made his way 
across the hall. Barry lay in the entry 
without, breathing heavily, his tongue 
lolling from his mouth; but his eyes were 
almost smiling, and his tail thumped 
against the stone floor. Behind him 
stood little Pierre, his cold hands wiping 
away his fast-freezing tears. 

Next day the monks learned that little 
Pierre was an orphan. At Aosta, on the 


194 Barry's Christmas Gift . 

other side of the mountain, the husband 
died on the same night that ended his 
wife’s life. The good Brothers accepted 
Pierre as a Christmas gift, and for years 
Barry considered him his especial charge 
and exercised toward him a fatherly 
care.- 

When spring came there was a new 
grave in the little cemetery by the Pass ; 
while no one ever sat in Brother Francis’ 
seat, but the book lay open there as he 
left it. 

Thirteen years after Brother Francis’ 
death another Brother Francis took his 
place, and joined in the noble work to 
which he, as little Pierre owed his life. 






I 



































